


Grounds for Divorce

by thefuckistevvs



Series: The Property of Red [2]
Category: Maggot Boy
Genre: AU where Parker dies and becomes an Aware, Abusive Relationships, Cannibalism kinda, M/M, Murder, Parker Dies Davey Lives AU, Stalking, Super unhealthy relationships like oh my god
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-17
Updated: 2015-08-26
Packaged: 2018-02-17 17:53:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 17
Words: 71,042
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2318165
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thefuckistevvs/pseuds/thefuckistevvs
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><em>There’s a hole in my neighborhood</em><br/><em>Down which of late I cannot help but fall</em><br/> <em>“Come on Baz, smile for me.”</em><br/>Sequel for The Property of Red, an Alternate Universe where Parker dies and becomes an Aware.<br/>Owen is causing terror on Sovereign City, and he demands Maggot Boy's attention.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. He kicks like a horse

**Author's Note:**

> “Come on Baz, smile for me.”

His headphones were slipping off his ears as the teenager was being held on a choke lock from behind, the attacker covering the teenager’s mouth with his stitched hand. The headphones completely slipped off his ears, letting Owen whisper to his ears.

“Come on Bas, smile for me.”

Bastian tried to get Owen off his back, but the small teenager had terrifying strength considering how small he was. Yeah, he had to stand on several boxes to be able to choke Bastian, but it still was very impressive.

 

It happened very suddenly, too. The football player was walking down the street to go to school until he felt someone drag him to an alley. He couldn’t see his attacker’s face, but by his voice and the strength of his grip he could very easily tell it was Owen the one that had dragged him.  

“Don’t go forgetting about our little deal, right? You say nay, I don’t kill your friends.” Owen pressed tighter forcing a whimper out of Bastian’s mouth, suddenly letting go and throwing the teenager to the ground.

“Come on Bas, you’ll be late for school! We can finish catching up later, right?”

Before Bastian could say anything else Owen had already left the scene, leaving the teenager to gasp for air in the floor of the alley. After some seconds, he got up rubbing his neck as it felt sore and crouched down to retrieve his headphones, adjusting them as if nothing had happened.

This disturbing behavior had started ever since he had left the hospital, Owen making sure he didn’t forget that he was being stalked 24/7 by the killer.

At this point, Bastian couldn’t do anything but endure it. Telling anyone would ensure Davey’s death, and not only his but maybe his family, his siblings…

He had to endure it, there was nothing else that he could do. The teenager felt guilty at the fact that he hadn’t fought back at the attacks even if doing so would have just killed him.

 

“Alan?” Davey grabbed the teenager’s attention with a harsh voice, the black haired boy immediately turning towards the brunette flinching.

“Wh-what do you want?” he said, his voice shaky as his friends stood behind him equally surprised and afraid.

“Oh, I’ve got business to deal with you, alright.” Davey closed his fists as he got near his classmate, Alan walking slowly backwards trying to get away from the angry brunette.

“I haven’t done anything, man! I haven’t-“

“Oh, you haven’t?”

Davey grabbed him by the collar, pulling the teenager uncomfortably close to his face, scowling as Alan closed his eyes as he began to sweat.

“You know very well what you are doing, Alan.” He almost whispered, the teenager flinching trying to get away from his grasp, but Davey wouldn’t let him get away. “The next time you do it, you won’t have the teacher’s help, got it?”

“Y-yeah, g-got it.” Alan whimpered, Davey throwing the teenager to the ground harshly. “Good.”

With that, Davey turned and stomped away in anger as he tried to calm down. His fists were shaking, but he didn’t immediately recur to violence. Well, he threatened violence, but the teenager figured that sometimes even that was simply just necessary.

He sighed, making a beeline to his locker and slamming it open, hastily grabbing the contents of it and putting them on his school bag. Slamming it closed again, he noticed Bastian beside him flinching at the noise.

“Oh shit, sorry Bas.” The teenager said guiltily as he adjusted the bag on his back. “Didn’t see you there.”

“No, it’s okay” Bastian smiled weakly. “How’s it going?”

“Eh, dealing with vermin, it’s all. You up for the movie theater tonight?”

Bastian shifted awkwardly on his place. “I don’t know…”

“Come on man, it’ll be good for you. Forgetting about shit for a second of your life, you know?”

Bastian pondered. Having to forget about every fucked up thing in his life did sound like a good idea, and as far as he didn’t tell anyone about Owen, his friends would be safe. He even felt sort of excited about the idea.

“Yeah okay, it actually sounds like a great idea.”

“Okay then, we can get over there after school is done. Oh, do you mind for… someone else to come?” Davey asked rather awkwardly, Bastian being slightly surprised. Who was Davey going to bring? Maybe some girl he was dating.

“Oh, sure. Who are you going to bring? Cass from math class? Or Rose the cheerleader?” Bastian snickered making Davey blush a little.

“What, no! I wouldn’t bring YOU to a date of mine, dude!” he softly elbowed Bastian, the taller teenager laughing at Davey’s embarrassment. “Nah man, it’s Micah.”

“Micah…?” Bastian knew the name was familiar, but he couldn’t recall exactly why. Seconds later he recalled Micah being Parker’s best friend, the two of them hanging out pretty much all the time.

 _Oh shit, Micah,_ the older teenager felt guilt. _I completely forgot about Micah_.

“I feel really guilty, you know? We… kinda completely forgot about him.” Davey scratched his head, feeling obviously guilty at how the two of them neglected the kid. “He is also in this with us. We… we all miss him a lot.”

“…Yes. Yes, you are right.”

They walked in silence to their next class, the bell ringing indicating it was time for students to enter their classrooms.

“You know, you’re a good person Davey.”

“What, me? Nah man, I’m an asshole.”

“You sure are, Davey.”

 

\---

 

The yellow light illuminated the empty streets of the city, every citizen having complied with the curfew that the authorities have imposed ever since the Sovereign killer had made his rounds. At first many bloggers and people in general complained about this extreme measures for one killer, but after the killings had gone up nobody complained about the curfew anymore.

The city was dead, including the two figures currently running down the street.

They had been running for several minutes, the one at front constantly pulling down trashcans and obstacles for the one running behind him to avoid.

Owen wasn’t actually trying that hard to get away, he was just having his fun as Parker chased him around the city.

“Come on Peej, I thought you could keep up!”

They kept running for several blocks, Parker trying his hardest to catch up with Owen but no matter what he did, it was as if Owen was several steps ahead of him (both figuratively and literally), as if Owen was purposely leading Parker somewhere.

“Hey Peej! When it’s your birthday?” Owen giggled, turning to an alley disappearing from Parker’s sight.

“Because I got a present for you!”

Parker turned around following him, but Owen was already gone; inspecting the area Parker had what seemed like paint at the wall at the bottom of the alley- getting close to it, the teen realized that it was actually blood.

 _Better luck next time!_ It said, with a smiley face scribbled at the bottom of it. Turning his gaze down, he saw a crumpled body covered with blood facing the wall. Gulping, Parker turned the body around to see their face, slightly flinching when he saw the open wounds and the lack of innards the body had.

“God…” Parker said, covering his mouth as he looked away.

He was too late.

 

\---

 

“Why is it that after a month and half, we still cannot find this kid?” Lazaro faced the window of the office his back turned to the three youngsters in his office. Chainey and Samantha seemed worried, but Parker seemed more annoyed than anything, what exactly Lazaro wasn’t sure. Nowadays Parker seemed annoyed whenever Lazaro came to see him, which wasn’t surprising, really.

“We are not detectives, Laz. You have what you get.” Parker grumbled, biting his lip and turning his gaze to the ground.

“I would have thought you would be competent enough to catch one of your kind.” Lazaro still didn’t turn around, Chainey wasn’t sure if he liked that or not, he just felt nervous in general.

“We’ve tried to chase him around, but he is too sneaky. No matter what we do it’s as if he is expecting us.” Chainey replied, begging to himself to not pass out.

“This guy… He knows we are after him, and he seems to keep killing so we find out about it. It’s as if he wants us to specifically go after him.”

Lazaro grunted something the youngsters couldn’t understand.

“This is an aware, we might need special forces to detain him.” Samantha suggested, and Parker scowled. As much as he didn’t want the Institution help, he had to admit that Owen needed to be stopped and maybe Lazaro could help. “Two people searching for him in a city this big is impossible, basically.”

“He keeps luring us to where he wants to go. Maybe with more people we can actually turn things around.”

Parker stayed silent, simply letting his friends talk. As much as he didn’t want to admit it, they were pretty much right.

“I’ll work on that,” Lazaro said as he turned to the trio. “You’ll still search around the city as you have done the past weeks. Don’t hold back if you see him.”

“What do you think we’ve been doing so far? Just fuck around?” Parker grumbled, meeting Lazaro’s gaze which suggested he was not in the mood for fooling around.

“…Yes, we will.” He muttered, scowling slightly.

“Very well, you may go.”

Silently, the three of them excited the office, leaving Lazaro alone with his own thoughts as he returned to stare out of the window of his office. Sighing, he grabbed his phone, calling his protégée.

“Noah, come to my office right now.”

 

“What is it Lazaro? You surely pulled me out of my very busy schedule for a very important reason.”

Somehow through the years, Noah had been the only individual that had been able to call out Lazaro without the worry of being fired right in the spot. No one really knew how this had happened, but nobody really dared to ask.

“We will need people to scout the city at night, we can’t let more murders to happen. Not only is it tainting our reputation as an Institution-“

“Because we have such good reputation.”

“-but we can’t let this happen any longer.”

“Gotcha, will do. Anything else for my bucket list?”

Lazaro rubbed his nose bridge as he tried to think clearly. The situation was going from bad to worse, having the fear that he would have to call someone for help.

“We might need to call someone to take care of the situation.” Lazaro sighed lazily.

“Call someone? We are normally the ones people call for help, who could possibly help _us_?”

“Her.”

 

Without having to explain, Noah immediately knew who Lazaro was talking about; surprised, his eyes widened for a second, biting his lip as he analyzed the situation.

“If you do that, Parker will be very-“

“I know. This is why I will use it as a last measure; I can’t afford more innocents dying.”

“You are so noble, Lazaro” Noah said sarcastically, rolling his eyes at his boss.

“I still find strange that even if you want to dissect that kid, and yet you still put his feelings into consideration for whatever decision you make.”

Lazaro stayed quiet, staring outside the window.

“Could it be? Does this mean actually have a heart?”

“Do as I told you, Noah. I’ll keep you informed in wherever we will bring her back or not.”

“Whatever you say, boss. Be careful though, your heart may be too weak for feelings.”

Saying that, Noah left the room ready to fulfill Lazaro’s requests, leaving the man wondering if what he was doing was the right thing.

No matter what Parker felt, Owen needed to be stopped, and Lazaro was going to do everything possible to ensure that.

 

\---

 

“Come on guys, dinner’s ready!”

Owen dumped the contents of a metal bucket onto the floor, human intestines spilling into the ground as the cats began to approach the pile of guts, meowing happily at their meal.

“Sorry I was late tonight, I had to make sure I lost PJ.” He sat on the wall as one of the smaller cats approached him, purring with its maw full of blood. “Guy is starting to be able to catch up with me! If I wasn’t planning the escape route every time, he probably would have caught me already!” Owen laughed, as the cat rested on his lap and the teenager scratching it behind its ears.

“This is turning so much better than I expected!” he licked the dried blood off his fingers. “I didn’t expect this guy to be so much fun.”

The cat meowed, Owen petting its back as he shrugged.

“What I will do next? Well, I’m not really sure. I don’t do well with the long term planning.”

Owen took the picture from his pocket, Parker, Bastian and Davey in it. The corners were slightly smeared with blood, but apart from that it was on very good condition, Owen always made sure he didn’t accidentally damage it.

“I want to have some fun with him first.”

 

\---

 

The teenager ran through the streets as he hissed through his closed teeth, working his hardest to lose the armed people chasing behind him. Owen felt stupid, he should have expected that after a while actual competent people would try and hunt him down, he made the mistake of being to careless when traveling through the city.

Didn’t matter, it shouldn’t be too hard to shake them off, after all Owen was far faster and sneakier than those guys but even so the teen couldn’t believe he was taken by surprise so easily.

He hid between the garbage dumps as he waited for the armored officials to pass; after they ran in the opposite direction Owen chuckled quietly to himself as he exited his hiding place.

“I wonder…” Owen mumbled to himself, quickly climbing the wall to the rooftops. At least he knew that there were more people patrolling the city at night, but he wondered if ‘Maggot Boy’ was scouting the streets as well.

It was worth a shot, he figured as he began his trek across the city, this time being more careful about being seen. He didn’t want to be found until he managed to reach PJ.

 

It didn’t actually took Owen too long to find Parker jumping around the rooftops on the city, the guy had some sort of schedule of the streets he went through. It was pretty stupid, Owen thought, but kinda cute.

He managed to sneak around while Parker took a break on the corner of the rooftop, the small teen grabbing Parker’s foot and pulling it towards him, slamming Parker’s face against the concrete.

“You have a thing for attacking from behind, don’t you?” Parker said groggily, his gaze shifting as he tried to focus on Owen.

“What can I say? It’s fun.” Owen replied as he sat on top of Parker’s chest, pressing his foot against the teenager’s face softly pressing his head against the concrete.

“Just saw your friends down there making their rounds around the city,” Owen said nonchalantly as he inspected his fingernails. “Party poopers, really.”

“What, did their presence prevent you from killing tonight?” Parker huffed as the sole dig deeper on his face, though with a small smile.

“Nope! Been there, done that!” Owen proudly exclaimed as Parker felt his heart sank. “It was a little bit harder, but that makes it fun.” Owen leaned extremely close to Parker’s face, he perceived the smell of blood out of Owen’s mouth. “You should find it soon, you know. If you don’t, a lot of preschoolers will be traumatized for life.”

 

Owen shoved his foot on Parker’s face deeper, prompting him to push the redhead off him and lunging to him, ready to punch Owen on the face.

He managed to hit him on the face, which made Owen stumble backwards trying to gain his balance; Parker took this as his opportunity to push Owen off the roof and succeeding on doing so.

Owen fell, but managed to stop himself from falling further by grabbing the ledge of a window slightly cracking it; the small teenager looked up to Parker who seemed to seethe on rage.

“Wow, Peej! I didn’t know you had it in you!” he screamed to the teenager peeking over the rooftop. “We aren’t that different after all! You just need a liiiiiiitle push-“

“Shut the fuck up!” Parker screamed back at the Owen, incredibly close to jumping and taking Owen with him- but it was far too stupid to even attempt.

“Think about it, Princess! My offer still stands, you know.” Owen smiled wide, pushing himself to the window and breaking it as he entered the building via the window, getting lost from Parker’s sight.

Parker cursed himself once again, muttering swears as he sat on the edge of the building. He was gone again, and even if Parker tried to chase him Owen would manage to escape every single time.

He buried his face on his palms, his lips shaking as he tried to figure out what he needed to do.

“What do I do, what do I do…” Parker began to softly sob on his palms, curling into himself.

“What would Davey do…?”

 

\---

 

“Hey Laz, thought you should know about this,” Noah swung by Lazaro’s office, the man barely awake as he drank his coffee even if Noah had forbid him from doing so long ago (“Caffeine cannot be good for you, Laz”). “There was another dead body this morning.”

“I suppose the reason you are telling me is because our killer did it.” Lazaro said between sips, staring down at Noah curiously.

“Bingo. Parker says that he managed to kill this person even though there were officers scouting the entire city. There was a group that managed to spot him and try to chase the suspect, but lost him. Time of death and the report say that this person was killed before he was spotted.”

“Oh, for fucks sake…” Lazaro rubbed his forehead with his bony palm, breathing deep as he tried to calm himself down from the terrible news.

“What should we do now? This is getting quite out of control.”

“It went out of control far too long ago.” Lazaro replied, leaning on his chair as he cleared his mind. “I should have done this long ago…”

“Sir?”

Lazaro sighed deeply, closing his eyes as he decided what needed to be done.

“Noah, I want you to call Marianne Sutton.” Noah’s eyes went wide, but before he could say anything his boss continued. “Tell her that if she catches him he can do whatever the fuck she wants with him, I don’t care. We need her back. I don’t care what Jones says about this, people are _dying_ out there, and as far as we know she is the only one that truly knows how to get rid of them. So bring her _in_ ”.

Noah blinked, and nodded leaving the room, not before muttering _I hate you_ on his way out.

Lazaro sighed. He would hate himself in that situation, as well.

He already hates himself for the situation they were in.

 


	2. Cocktail

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maggot Boy Lives

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Davey discovers what consequences to his acts are, Marianne returns and Chainey thinks about his past.

“Hey, are you crazy or something? There is a curfew for a reason!”  The teenager loudly whispered as he looked around paranoid of who might be lurking. “There is a serial killer on the loose!”

“Micah, I told you to not follow me, don’t come complaining to me that you don’t want to be here.” Davey quietly replied as he shook another can of spray paint, pressing it releasing the paint to the brick wall in front of him. “I’ll be done soon, anyways.”

“This is where you have been sneaking to these past afternoons?! If I knew you were risking your life like this, I would have slapped you!” Micah continued to protest, as he got closer to Davey afraid that anything would jump at them. “Come on, we need to go!” he urged.

“Give me a sec…” Davey bit his lip as he continued to paint the wall a couple of more times. Micah was too busy being scared for his life to even pay attention at what Davey was exactly painting, but he thought the wall was familiar.

“Wait, wasn’t this wall the one that was tagged by the weird zombie cult and shit?” Micah asked as he clung to Davey’s red’s hoodie, not letting his guard down for a single second in fear that the killer might catch them.

“Yup,” Davey replied quietly. “Couldn’t stand their bullshit, had to do something about it.”

“Won’t they get mad?”

“Who cares?” Davey stepped back to see his work, the small teenager still clinging to his hoodie. “Alright, it’s done.”

“Now can WE go? I swear, if I get killed because of you then-“ Micah trailed off when he finally saw what Davey had been working on for the past weeks.

 

The painting covered the entire brick wall, leaving no trace of the crude words written beneath it. It was a hand rising from the depths of the ground; its fist clenched with a tire iron on its grasp, the hand was grey and decaying, as if it was dead.

Under it, there were words written with red paint, and they said

_Maggot Boy Lives_

“Alright, what do you think?” Davey said as he examined the painting, turning to the small teenager who was still clutching Davey’s hoodie.

“It’s… really good, Davey.” Micah eyes were wide with wonder as he saw the picture.

“Okay, time to go. I’ll walk you home, it is pretty late anyways.” Davey said as he carelessly began to walk down the alley as he grabbed his backpack, Micah following closely behind.

“I swear to god Davey, if we get killed because of your stupid painting, I will haunt your ass.”

“How will you haunt me if I am dead as well?”

“I…” Micah growled as his logic was questioned. “Okay, I’ll haunt your dumbass painting or something. Haunt anyone that comes close to it.”

“Sounds good to me. Come on; be quiet, if anyone spots us we will get in so much trouble.”

“Yeah, yeah…”

Micah eyed the alleys in a worried manner as he kept as close as possible from Davey. Granted, about an hour had passed ever since the curfew started, but Micah knew that the killer wasn’t afraid of killing in the middle of the day, what was to stop him from killing in the night?

Micah gulped as he kept close to Davey, the teenager leading them through narrow alleys that Micah had never seen much less walked through. “Where are we going?”

“I’m getting you home; I know some shortcuts around the city. If we walk through the streets then we’ll be in trouble.”

“But- what if the killer finds us?”

“I won’t let that happen.” Replied back the brunette, Micah felt a sense of security on his voice and he indeed felt more secure.

That is, until the Brunette stopped in his tracks examining his surroundings.

“…Huh.”

“Huh? Huh what? What do you mean Huh?!” Micah began to silently freak out as he tugged from the red hoodie harder.

“I... I think we took the wrong turn. No worries, we just need to backtrack a little.”

“Oh god, oh god we are so dead…”

“Shut up, Micah. Come on…” Davey sounded nervous, as he began to walk faster towards the alleys, getting even more nervous as the minutes passed.

“Shit, I can’t find it… there was supposed to be some graffiti here but, I can’t find it.”

“We are lost?!”

“Micah, we’ll get us out of this, don’t worry.”

Micah clenched his teeth as he began to shake, closing his eyes as he didn’t let go from Davey who kept roaming around the alleys trying to find the way home once again, but they kept walking for several minutes without reaching any place in particular.

 

“Okay, Okay, this is what we are going to do-“

Before Davey could finish, a dumpster fell to the ground provoking both teenagers to scream, only to become extremely embarrassed when they saw a cat coming out of the dumpster.

“Oh hey, cat… hey cat…” Davey said ashamed, his face reddened at the sudden scare he had.

“Great, what we needed. I hate cats.”

As Micah said that, another cat popped out from an alley, and another more, eventually a herd of cats appearing from all directions.

“That’s… odd.” The brunette tried to not pay attention to the cats but it was extremely difficult considering that they were making a circle around them, but they weren’t going to hurt them, right? They seemed pretty familiar.

They also had blood on their maws.

“Okay, time to run. Come on Micah, we have to-“

 

A figure with a cat mask and a black hoodie with cat ears jumped from the rooftop landing between the two teenagers wielding a rusty wrench, swinging it in the air as he attempted to hit the taller teenager on the face.

Davey was fast enough to sidestep, avoiding to get hit by the wrench by mere centimeters. Micah was too shocked to do anything but stare, Davey catching his attention as he screamed at the teenager.

“RUN!”

Owen swung once again, this time hitting Davey squarely on the face and knocking him out. Micah covered his mouth with his hands as he began to ran away from the killer, Owen taking notice of this and running towards the small teenager.

 

Micah ran as fast as his legs let him, his heart beating harshly in his chest as his legs began to burn from how much he had ran. He had no idea where he was going, but several thoughts passed through his mind as he took quick breaths with his mouth.

His stomach hurt, his head hurt; his entire body was screaming with pain for the sudden exercise, but Micah didn’t care, the only thing he cared about was his primal instinct to run. He felt the wrench hit him hard on his back, knocking the air out of him and sending him slamming his body against the floor, feeling as if the ground came crashing against him harshly instead.

 _Nononononononononono_ , his head screamed as he begged his body to get up but it hurt way too much, every muscle on the teen’s body screaming in pain.

“Man, for being so small, you sure do run fast.” He saw the cat mask staring down at him, the wrench at his side. “Damn it, what is it with me picking up cute guys?” Micah was far too out of it to understand what the hell Owen was talking about, the only thing in his mind was how fucked he was.

“Please, I-“ Micah began to beg, but he was met with the wrench harshly hitting him on the head. Stars drowned his vision, he heard everything as if he was underwater with a loud buzzing on his head, warm liquid coming out from it. The last time he felt like this was when Alan had knocked him against the lockers and he lost consciousness; he knew that at any moment he would lose it as well, the difference was that he was never going to wake up.

“I don’t want to die.” He heard himself say, the black creeping into the corners of his vision as the cat’s mask came closer and closer.

 

Before Owen did anything to Micah, someone from behind hit him straight in the head with a hammer cracking his mask and making the teen stumble in surprise; Davey grabbed the hammer he picked up from one of the alleys dumpsters tightly as he hit the killer one more time in the back of the head, the hit forcing Owen to steady himself in the wall so he wouldn’t fall flat on his face, blood pouring from his head. He tried to steady himself once again, only for Davey to swing the hammer once again, this time hitting the small teen on the top of the head.

Stumbling, Owen cradled his face with his hands as he ran away as fast as possible from the couple, Davey beginning to chase him only to stop when he heard Micah grunt from behind him.

Still grabbing the hammer tightly in case the killer came back, Davey ran to Micah’s side. The small teenager was a mess, a trail of blood falling across his pale face as he seemed to try his hardest to stay awake.

Davey couldn’t remember anything about first aid, but he did know (from his previous experiences with concussions, courtesy of bad skating tricks) that whoever had the concussion should be awake.

“Micah? You okay man? Don’t worry, I’m here now.”

“Davey?” Micah answered groggily, his voice sleepy. “My head hurts.”

“I know, don’t worry alright, I-I’ll take you to the hospital, but you can’t fall asleep, okay?” Davey’s voice sounded nervous as he tried to manage the situation, his fingers slightly shaking afraid of touching the smaller teenager in fear he would shatter. “Just- don’t go to sleep, you need to stay awake, okay? You need to stay awake.” Davey put the hammer on his pocket, the head of it poking outside if he ever needed it again.

“I-“ Micah frowned, he didn’t seem to understand what exactly was happening, his pale face looking even paler (was that possible?) “I’ll try…?”

“Good, Okay.” Davey looked around, he could actually recognize what alley they were in, it wouldn’t take him too long to get to the main street which was littered with police officers; they could surely help.

“Don’t worry man, this has happened to me a lot when I skated. You’ll be okay? I promise.”

 

Davey carefully lifted Micah on his arms trying to not move the teenager’s head, feeling his stomach going cold when Micah’s head lolled back limply.

“Micah, come on, stay awake.” Davey began to panic, slightly tightening his grip on the teenager as he rushed to the hospital. “Micah? Micah, can you hear me?”

There was no reply. “Micah?”

“Oh _fuck,_ oh please no,” Davey tried to choke tears, finally reaching the main street and spotting already a couple of officers from the Institution wandering around.

“Help- Please! I need help! Someone please help me!” the teenager screamed catching the officer’s attention, quickly running towards Davey.

“Please, I-“ His legs gave out, the adrenaline wearing out as he realized himself that blood was coming from his nose and busted lip from Owen’s assault earlier. He began to shake as he realized how limp Micah was.

“I’m so sorry.”

 

\---

 

Owen curled himself to a corner of the abandoned building he had adopted as a home for the night, clutching his head as his blood seeped through his hair. He was lucky he managed to escape without crashing on his face, the hits from the brunette having had a terrible effect on his motor skills.

He would be fine, but Owen still couldn’t believe how a mere human like that could simply defeat Owen like that. Him, _Owen_ , defeated by a simple human; and not even a strong one, just a teenager.

The teen hissed in pain, his head pounding as he pressed his forehead against the wall. He was planning on chasing PJ once again, but his world was too painful for him to even think about doing anything that wasn’t lying down like a lazy piece of shit.

Cats surrounded him purring, making company to their owner who was clearly distressed. He welcomed the company, curling on the floor as the cats curled around their owners as they fell asleep.

 

\---

 

Parker laid his upper body on the desk lazily, randomly grabbing sheets of papers and trying to read them only for Noah to snatch them from his hands before the teen could make any sense of it.

“Come on Noah, you really can’t tell me anything? I am basically the head of this investigation!” Parker said as he tried to grab more sheets for paper, only for the man to snatch them once again from the teenager’s fingers.

“I am not allowed to disclose any kind of information, Parker. Lazaro would have my head on a platter if I did so.” Noah answered annoyed, going through his papers already annoyed with the amount of work he had. He needed to review every useless report the guards made the previous night, along with the other normal tasks he had in the day, it didn’t help Parker kept nagging him for information.

“Come on, Noah. Lazaro doesn’t want to tell me anything, can’t you tell me if anything important has happened?”

“I’m going to say this in a language you can understand. No.”

The teenager grunted in annoyance as he slid off the desk into the floor. Parker had felt incredibly useless since he hadn’t been able to catch Owen at all, he needed to know if there was information that could help him with capturing him. It didn’t seem like he was convincing Noah to help him however, leaving the teenager resigned to keep doing what he was doing before.

“Now, if you excuse me, I need to get back to work,” Noah grabbed a set of very specific yellow tinted sheets of papers, eyeing them before Parker quickly grabbed them and ran to the opposite side of the room, climbing on top of a bookshelf so he would be left alone.

“Parker, please. I need to get back to my job, stop acting like a goddamned cat so get back here.” Noah said nervously, very aware of what the sheets said, Parker reading them intently with wide eyes.

“What… what is this?” he said with a low voice, his fingers beginning to shake as he kept reading the papers in his hands. “What is- what is this?”

“Parker…” Noah tried to calm him down, but Parker just threw the papers to the ground all crumpled, baring his teeth to no one in particular.

“He lied.”

“Parker, the circumstances-“

“ _He Lied”_

He jumped off the bookshelf, running outside of the office as fast as he could, leaving Noah to gather the papers the teenager had thrown to the ground.

“Well, fuck.” The man muttered to himself as he tried to straighten the paper, the writing on it still luckily legible by normal standards.

Noah wasn’t happy at the contents of the paper, but it was his boss’s orders, so he would have to deal.

_Marianne Sutton, Surgeon. Employer: The Institution._

 

\---

 

“Oh, what a mess. It wouldn’t have killed them to tidy this place out.”

Marianne put her bags on the table, disgusted at how messy her operation room was; it was left pretty much intact, but dust had accumulated on the floor along with bugs.

“Well, time to clean up.”

The redhead was actually surprised how easy it was for Noah to convince her to come back to the institution. She was even more surprised that after the little incident she had with Parker Jones Lazaro would still send Noah to personally hire her back, it seemed like the situation REALLY was dire.

 

“Sorry Noah, I very much enjoy not being bossed by Lazaro anymore.” The redhead smiled tauntingly as she got up from the table, ready to go back to baking more cookies.

“You can keep him.”

Marianne’s eyes widened, stopping in her tracks as she turned around to face Noah once again.

The possibility of having an aware on her power… to do whatever she wanted with him. To be able to truly _understand_ what they were.

And this time no one could stop her.

“I’m in.”

 

Marianne had finished dusting the floor of her old operating room, spreading her medical tools on the surgical table along with a bowl of cookies. The door to the room slammed open, slightly startling Marianne who turned around betting it was Lazaro the one that was making that ruckus.

“Parker, darling, I haven’t seen you in a long time!”

Parker just stood in the doorway unmoving simply staring at the woman in front of him.

“I wanted to tell you the good news, but it seems you already found out. I’m so glad to see you, Pj-“

“What are you doing here?” Parker growled softly, walking slowly towards the woman. She towered him easily, but he didn’t seem intimidated by her at all, if anything he was _furious_.

“Well, I got called to deal with the little killer problem we currently have.” She chuckled, gathering a cookie and taking a bite out of it. “I knew Lazaro would need me sooner or later.”

Parker continued to stare.

“Parker… I actually wanted to speak with you, but I didn’t have a chance until now. I hope we can put what happened between us behind, and move on with our lives.”

She leaned to Parker, passing her fingers through his hair his face still emotionless

“I want to be your friend, right? Remember what you said back then? That we were friends?” Parker’s mouth twitched. “I would do anything for you, PJ. I hope you can understand what I did and why I did it.”

Parker slightly nodded. Marianne smiled widely as she clapped her hands together.

“Great! I’m so glad you understand.” She turned into the table where her tools were spread, her left hand reaching to the bowl of cookies.

“What makes you think,” Parker said as he grabbed one of the surgical knives on Marianne's table, swiftly stabbing it on Marianne’s left palm as hard as he could, the blade going through her palm and stabbing the table, pinning her to it; the redhead screamed, Parker still holding the knife in place as she stared at him with terror. “That I understand?”

“P-Pa-Parker, I-I think-“ Marianne hissed between her teeth, screaming even more when Parker twisted the knife stabbing her palm.

He leaned close to her face, the woman sweating and panting while he kept holding the knife.

“Do what you have to do and _leave_ ” he hissed, not blinking once as he stared the woman down. “Or I’ll _kill_ you. I tell you this as a _friend_.”

He let go of the knife leaving it as it was still pinning Marianne’s palm to the table. Parker said nothing as he walked away and closed the door.

Marianne bit her lip, grabbing the knife as she took a deep breath while she quickly took the knife out of her palm.

She screamed.

 

\---

 

_“Anthony Chainey”_

Chainey couldn’t keep Owen’s voice out of his head, how the killer knew his name and seemed to know him personally.

No matter how much he tried, Chainey couldn’t remember anything about his past life. He only knew that his name felt… right, and that he used to be alive.

It was soothing for him, having waking up with no memories. He didn’t have anything to regret, and he didn’t miss the life he had before he became a zombie. It made the whole ‘Aware’ business far easier for him.

He sighed. Chainey had been thinking about his past and Owen for several days now, every single time they went scouting expecting he would find the teen once again to find out more about his past, but it seemed like Owen cared more about PJ rather than him. Maybe this was for the best, the last time they faced each other Owen almost killed him.

Samantha leaned on the couch Chainey’s was lying on.

“Something on your mind, Chainey?” Asked the redhead as she drank a soda through a straw.

“Lots, actually, which is funny considering the, well you know.” He said as he pointed to the back of his head, giving an awkward smile.

“Just worried about Owen and stuff, not much.” The tall teenager replied as Samantha leaned her cheek on the spine of the couch.

“It’s just a matter of time, Chainey. We will surely get him soon.” The redhead replied.

“Well, yeah. But what bothers me is that,” Chainey frowned as he covered his eyes with his palm. “I just wonder, how he knew so much about me? I just feel lost, Sam. I got nothing.”

She looked down at him feeling guilty. “Chainey, I’m so sorry. We haven’t had time to deal with you and your memories due to Owen. But after this gets resolved we will try our hardest to find out who you are.”

“Well, I know who I am. At least that’s something.”  Chainey grunted. “I just want to know who I _was_. How I _died_.”

“You think Owen might know?”

“Maybe… Probably… Agh, who knows at this point? Maybe I just went to the same school at him and he’s just pretending he knows who I am.” The teenager groaned even louder than last time.

“Ugh, what a mess.”

“I wish I could help, Chainey.”

“Yeah… it’s okay Sam, thanks for listening.”

 

Samantha was about to reply back to the teenager but before she could the metallic curtain opened up, an extremely tired Parker entering the warehouse and closing the curtain once again.

“Hey Peej, how did it go?” the redhead cheerfully asked, her smile disappearing when she realized how much a mess Parker looked like.

“Hey Sam.” he replied tiredly. “Look, can we talk later? I-I really need to take a nap, a long one.” Parker ran his fingers through his hair.

“Okay. If you need anything, call me or call Chainey, okay?”

“Yeah okay.” The teenager made a beeline to his room, closing the door behind him as he disappeared.

Chainey sighed, turning the television on while news as he began to doze off.

 _Damnit, I need to control this…_ his eyes already felt heavy, not paying attention to what the television was saying, and Samantha was too concentrated in her own things to pay attention to the news.

He began to snore when the reporter on television started the new segment.

 _“Last night two teenagers were attacked by the Sovereign City Killer…_ ”


	3. Coma

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maggot Boy wouldn’t ignore him anymore.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bastian can't sleep, Parker decides to take a break, Owen wants attention and Marianne begins her search.

[2:10:11]MCGEE: hey baz

[2:10:17]MCGEE: baz wake up

[2:10:24]MCGEE: baz wake up baz baz wake up

[2:10:34]MCGEE: baz baz baz baz baz baz baz

 

Bastian grunted, waking up from his deep sleep by the incessant messages from McGee as he groggily grabbed the phone to check his messages. The light from the screen hurt his eyes, squinting so he could read what his friend was nagging him so much about at such ridiculous hours of the night.

 

[2:12:09]B. Nightingale: mcgee

[2:12:11]B. Nightingale: its 2 am

[2:12:20]B. Nightingale: cant it wait until tomorrow?

[2:12:30]MCGEE: baz!!! Did you hear about what happened? :O

[2:13:10]B. Nightingale: what?

[2:13:15]B. Nightingale: what happened?

[2:13:25]MCGEE: oh baz, youre not gonna believe this!!!

_MCGEE is writing..._

 

Bastian could see the little emoticon of the pencil writing on the screen, now fully awake as he waited for McGee’s explanation of what he was talking about. The teenager felt uneasy, something creeping on his stomach with every second that it took McGee to write.

[2:16:20]MCGEE: davey and micah were attacked by the sov killer a couple of hours ago!!! They are both at the hospital but idk what happened!!!!!

Bastian felt his stomach going cold, getting goose bumps all over his skin with a knot on his throat.

 _I didn’t tell anyone,_ he began to panic as he got up from his bed in a jump turning the lights on dressing as soon as the teenager could, cold sweat dripping from his forehead. A ping came out of his cellphone, he quickly grabbed it with shaking fingers as he tried to focus his eyes to read what the screen said.

[2:18:25]MCGEE: i heard from mickey and steven that he fought off the killer and is ok but I dont know?? They arent letting anyone in??? both their parents are there anyways.

[2:19:30

]MCGEE: just wanted to let u know maybe u want to skip school tomorrow to visit them.

 

Bastian tried to calm down. They were okay, they were both okay… There was absolutely nothing he could do anyways, he wasn’t going to get let in the hospital at this point, he had to wait until things calmed down a little.

 

[2:22:10]B. Nightingale: Thanks McGee, I’ll do that tomorrow.

[2:23:00]MCGEE: calm down k cap? theyre ok, just thought u should know.

 

Bastian lay on his mattress once again, his eyes twitching and his mouth shaking. He hadn’t told anyone about the killer apart from his first experience, the teenager didn’t dare of even thinking of telling anyone about him being constantly stalked by him. And even so, Davey and Micah were affected by it.

Did he lie? Did the killer just decide he had his fun and that it was time to dispose of them? He never mentioned Micah anyways, just Davey; maybe Micah just happened to be hanging out with Davey at the time.

Maybe it was just a coincidence, but whatever it was Bastian felt his stomach knotting over worry. If anything too serious had happened he would have been called already, or at least that is what he wanted to think.

But like McGee said, there was absolutely nothing he could do at the moment, so he resigned to lay on his bed as he tried to gain sleep.

 

It was a restless night.

 

\---

 

_“You trust me as a friend, don’t you?”_

Parker woke up with a jump as he gasped for air that he didn’t actually need, taking him a while to calm down as he reclined his head once again in the pillow.

He had a nightmare about Marianne once again. The teenager hadn’t had nightmares dealing with the woman in a long while, but learning that she was returning to complete her job brought back all the terrible memories. There was nothing he could do about it, as much as he hated the woman he had to admit that they desperately needed help, and he was far too tired of being lured by Owen again and again into where he wanted to go.

 

If he knew anything, he knew that Marianne would get the job done. The woman was terrifying in several aspects, and Owen was dangerous sure, but Parker knew that if there was anyone that could stop Owen it would be her. Otherwise, why would Lazaro break his promise and bring her back?

 

He took a bowl full of human liver, placing it in the microwave as he turned the machine on. The teen felt too tired, he was exhausted of his (un)life; the only thing he wanted to do was to lay down for a while without having to think on how to stop a serial killer on the loose.

When the microwave was done he carelessly grabbed the bowl, not even caring only the top of it was reheated; he simply took it to the table and began to eat it without actually paying attention to his meal.

“Hey Peej,” Chainey yawned as he sat on a chair next to the table, the tall man seemed as tired as Parker, but again Chainey always seemed tired. “When are we heading out today?”

“We are not heading out today,” Parker said nonchalantly as he shoved a spoon full of liver to his mouth.

“Wait, we aren’t going out scouting for Owen?” Parker’s news seemed to wake Chainey up, surprised at how the brunette simply reached that decision.

“No, it’s going to be dealt with.” He slurped the half hot/half cold blood on the bowl.

“What’s wrong, PJ? I-“

“Good morning boys!” Samantha entered the room stretching her arms; unlike Parker and Chainey, the woman seemed to have had an actual good night of sleep.  “What’s going to be your vigilante’s schedule today?”

“There is none,” Parker replied still eating the last bits of human organ off his bowl. “We won’t go out anymore.”

“Oh,” Samantha replied extremely confused. “…Why?”

“It’s being dealt with, I don’t think we are necessary anymore.”

“Did Lazaro or Noah tell you anything yesterday when you went to the Institution?” Samantha asked curiously, grabbing the now empty bowl to wash it, but being stopped by Parker who got up and cleaned it off himself.

“Well, kinda. I…” He gulped. “They hired Marianne again. To catch Owen.”

 

Samantha’s eyes went wide, biting her lip as he sat down the table covering her mouth with her hands, thoughtful; the tap water running freely on the sink.

“…Who’s Marianne?” Chainey dared to ask.

“She…” Parker turned the tap water off, cleaning his hands as he turned to face Chainey very obviously nervous. “She used to work in the institution.”

Parker bit his lip. “She… she did something _terrible_ , something I will never be able to forget. She was fired because of it, but now that the situation has gone from bad to worse she was hired to get rid of Owen.”

Parker took a deep breath, feeling a bit more at ease now that he explained some of what was happening.

“It’s under control. We can relax a little.”

“That’s good! You two haven’t had a day without worrying yourselves in months. This is going to be good for you.” Samantha smiled softly, as Parker chuckled.

“Do you think…. They will kill him?”

 

“…What?” Asked Parker slightly confused, not exactly sure what Chainey was actually talking about.

“Owen. Do you think they will kill him? He…” Chainey scratched the back of his head. “He seems to know about my past.”

“Probably not,” Samantha spoke. “They will probably want to study him and stuff, since he is an Aware like you guys. You will have plenty of time to ask him about it.”

“Samantha is right, Chainey. They will catch him alive, and then we can find out what the hell that guy knows about you.”

“I guess you are right,” Chainey sighed, reclining his head on the wooden chair.

“Of course I’m right, I’m always right!” Parker laughed, feeling truly relaxed for the first time in months.

 

\---

 

Owen slammed the wrench against the brick wall causing a large dent to it, as small rubble began to fall from the crater. Huffing, he slammed the wrench to the same spot once again, this time even harder than before leaving an even bigger crater on the wall.

“ _Where is he?_ ” Owen hissed as he slammed the wrench on another part of the wall. _“He was supposed to be here, where is HE?!_ ” he basically began to silently yell to himself as he continued to hit the walls as hard as he could.

About a month had passed ever since that one teenager beat the shit out of Owen with a hammer, forcing Owen to take a two day break from killing and harassing in general due to his physical state. Even if he was already dead, those hammer hits fucked him up severely; not only did he have killer headaches but his body felt extremely sore as well.

After that, he hadn’t seen Maggot boy nor Chainey wandering around the city, as if they suddenly disappeared. It was driving him crazy, not knowing for what reason PJ suddenly refused to show up; at first it was curious, but at this point it was driving Owen insane.

“Why hasn’t he shown up?!” he screamed as he threw the wrench to another wall, leaving a dent on it as well as the wrench bounced to the floor, sliding to Owen’s feet once again.

He felt _insulted_ that Parker wouldn’t come searching for him for several days in a row. Did he not care that he would continue killing people? Did he not give a shit anymore?

 

“I’ll make him care,” Owen retrieved a pocket knife from one of his pants pockets, taking the picture he had stolen from Bastian along with it. He put the picture on the wall, slamming the knife on it leaving it pinned in place; agitated, Owen leaned down and grabbed a bone saw he scavenged from the garbage time ago, along with a couple of knives he put in his pants pockets.

“I’ll make him care, alright.” He climbed out of the window of the abandoned building, making his way to the streets as he carried his tools with him. Owen was someone that liked to go big, but this time he would go _big_ alright, he was going to make all Sovereign City pay attention to him big time. They wouldn’t ignore him anymore.

 _Maggot Boy_ wouldn’t ignore him anymore.

 

\---

 

Marianne didn’t simply just run around the city trying to find Owen, that isn’t how she did things. Opposite from Parker and Chainey, she preferred to do things quietly, sneaking around trying to find some pattern in Owen’s attacks. Even if Owen was a very unpredictable being, everything had patterns, and Marianne was close to find his, she could barely contain her joy.

Even though the woman was warned about how absolutely dangerous Owen was, Marianne still walked on the streets at night with one tranquilizer gun and nothing more; she trusted her tranquilizers (personally made by her, one of the amazing things she got out of Parker’s incident) were more than enough.

 _Come out wherever you are…_ She playfully thought as she walked through the alleys of the cities, waiting for her prey to make himself visible.

She heard the very faint sound of slurping, and Marianne smiled like she never smiled before.

 

Careful, the redhead peeked her head on the alley, and sure enough she saw a figure’s back, kneeling on something Marianne could only assume used to be a human body.

 _Oh, he never did this much of a mess_ , Marianne thought as she continued to examine the hunched small figure as it ate.

She silently aimed her tranquilizer gun, smiling as she did so and pulled the trigger. The little dart traveled silently through the air as it pinned itself on the teen’s back, the figure flinching and pulling the dart out of his back. Surprised, he then turned back to Marianne, his eyes full of rage and confusion.

“Hello, Cupcake!” Marianne took a step standing now directly in front of Owen, her gun in her right hand as she smiled to the perplexed teen. “I’ve been looking all over for you, you know?”

 

Owen lunged at her with a bloodied bone saw, but he didn’t have enough strength; he fell to the floor as he stared at his palms in confused horror.

“Oh honey, that’s what happens when you are injected with a tranquilizer!” Marianne lifted the gun on her hand proudly. “This one is special however, made specifically for your kind!”

Owen quickly turned around, grabbing his saw as he began to run as fast as he could to somewhere else; but his legs felt heavy and he already felt drowsy.

“Oh come on, cupcake! I won’t hurt you! That’s not even possible!” Marianne playfully said as she began to chase the young man in her high heels, having no trouble running with them.

The Aware just kept trying to run, being slightly faster than the woman behind him but even still he felt how his strength kept draining more and more, his eyes feeling heavy as he tried his hardest to run away.

“Think of what we can learn from you!” the woman behind him yelled joyfully, as she kept her pace. “Think of the medical breakthroughs! Aren’t you interested?”

Owen didn’t even dignify the question with an answer, his world started to blur as he tried his hardest to hide, but no matter how many turns he took he couldn’t shake the woman off.

He felt how another dart logged on his back, and the world crashed on him. The last thing he felt was the cold concrete on his face, not losing consciousness but knowing that he couldn’t move his body anymore.

“Well, that wasn’t that hard…” the woman replied as she kneeled at Owen’s side, smiling slightly as she realized just how small the kid was.

“All of this just for someone so young? Dear, you sure are something, aren’t you?” She gently passed her fingers through Owen’s hair, his eyes shooting wide open as he stared at the woman.

With his last bit of strength, he swung the bone saw he had been holding the entire time, slicing the woman legs causing her to fall, taking this as an opportunity to run the fuck away.

 

“Ngh!” Marianne cringed as she tried to stand up, she managed to succeed, trying to run to catch up with the sedated child, but it was way too painful for her. She hissed, clenching her fist as she let the kid run away.

“Another time, perhaps…” she scowled as she began to make her way back, blood trickling off her legs; clutching the tranquilizer gun between her fingers.

 

Owen managed to climb into the house window, not thinking too much why he decided to go to that very specific address. Luckily, the window was open, allowing him to climb and enter the room. It was fairly late, meaning that the person inside was already asleep.

He walked towards the bed, crashing against the floor as he dragged the sheets along with him, waking up the owner of the room.

 

Bastian fell off his bed when he discovered Owen unconscious on the floor.

 

\---

 

 _I’m thirsty_.

Strangely enough, that was the first thing he became aware of, that and that his body felt weird. Consciousness came to him in layers, only aware of the fact that he was incredibly thirsty, but apart from that he had no idea what was happening around him.

“ _…a week…”_

He could her voices in the room, but the teen couldn’t actually understand what they were saying, they sounded slightly muffled.

_“-any time soon?”_

_“…everything we can.”_

_“-maybe years…”_

_“…and wait.”_

Slowly, Micah began to understand what was happening. He was in a bed in a fairly cool room, and he could feel people were along with him.

“ _Thank you for coming by.”_ Micah recognized that voice, it was his father’s and Micah felt strange since he never heard his own father so worried before.

 _“I’m sorry about this, sir.”_ He recognized that voice as well. It was Davey’s, and he seemed to sound okay, if anything he sounded extremely tired.

They spoke again, but they did it in almost a whisper Micah had no idea what they actually said. By now, he felt like it was time for him to get up, slowly becoming aware of everything around him apart from the voices.

Okay, he was thirsty, but he already knew that. He was also lying on a bed with thin sheets covering his frame; he could feel his legs and his hands- also good.

There was also a long tube going into his throat. Okay, that was slightly strange.

 

The sole experience of regaining his consciousness already exhausted him, and the teenager hadn’t even opened his eyes yet.

Several minutes passed until he managed to register every sensation on his body, as far as he knew he was alive. Or so it seemed. Next he tried to open his eyes.

 

“…Nngh,” he softly muttered as he shifted beneath the sheets, small twinges of pain traveling across his body. Micah didn’t expect the room to be this damn bright.

He heard footsteps on the room quickly moving towards him, calling to him, but Micah was far too busy trying to open his eyes without them burning to pay attention to what the voice said.

Micah opened his eyes once again, this time the teen managed to tolerate the light on his face but everything seemed blurry and slowly shifting into place; the same voice from before called him once again, now the teen able to understand what it said.

“Micah? Can you hear me?”

Focusing his eyes he barely recognized the figure as Davey, if only for his trademark hoodie. The taller teenager had changed his hair, now sporting a Mohawk instead of his normal fluffy hair; Micah understood why when he saw a freshly stitched wound on one of the sides of his head.

“Don’t be so loud,” Micah rasped slightly horrified at how damaged he sounded, and feeling the tube still inside of him awkwardly, should he simply take it out? “The hell-“

He felt some IV’s pinned on his arm, wanting to yank them off but deciding not to; even he knew when not to do things.

“How are you feeling?”

“Like shit.” The tube made him feel way too uncomfortable; he wished he could just pull it out of his throat.  “Where’s dad?”

“He went out to talk to some doctors for a while.” Davey seemed more relaxed now that he knew that Micah was okay. “He’ll feel bad he wasn’t here when you woke up.”

“As if.” Micah whispered, reclining his head against the very soft pillow. “He’s probably upset he isn’t at work right now…” Speaking was easier for him now, but the tube still upset him.

“Don’t say that.” The brunette scratched the back of his head; even if he was calmed Micah could feel the guilt on Davey’s eyes.

“What… happened?” He asked groggily. “Last night…”

“Erhm,” Davey frowned in worry, walking towards a chair and dragging it to the teen, sitting on it at the side of the bed. “It’s, it’s kind of a long story.”

“I’m not going anywhere…”

“I should call your dad, tell him-“

“Davey.”

The brunette sighed, giving in to Micah’s request.

“He… the killer was going to kill you, so I hit him with a hammer; I saw police men and asked them for help, we went to the hospital but you were already on a coma.” Davey’s gaze was on the floor not facing the teen’s eyes. “So that’s pretty much it.”

“Wait,” Micah tried to move to sit up but his body screamed in protest. “You hit him with a hammer?”

“Yeah?”

“You don’t realize how hardcore that is?”

“I don’t know. I just- I panicked, I guess.”

Micah was perplexed at the fact that Davey was being so nonchalant about this. He beat up the killer with a hammer to save him. To save him! No one would have done that same thing, Micah was actually surprised Davey didn’t just run away and left him for dead.

“Whatever,” Micah was far too tired to talk about how stupid Davey was for not realizing how _awesome_ that was, he decided to change topics. “How-“

 

“Micah?!” His father burst inside the room all of sudden, making his way hurriedly to his son’s bed.

Micah had never seen his father like that, normally the only things he worried about were ridiculous work stuff Micah never gave a shit about, but this time around his father seemed… very worried. Extremely worried.

“Oh God, you’re awake…”

“Dad, hey.” Micah coughed, the tube tickling the inside of his throat.

“We- we thought you wouldn’t make it, doctors had no idea when you would wake up-“

“It was only a day,” Micah said moving slightly as he tried to make himself comfortable, closing his eyes (that light is too damn bright).

He opened his eyes when he realized how quiet everybody had gone, worry and awkwardness painted on their faces.

“It- it wasn’t a day, Micah.” The brunette replied, his eyes locking with Micah’s as the small teen could feel his stomach going cold.

“…how long was it?” he finally dared to ask, terrified of the answer.

“A month.”

 

Micah blinked several times, as he began to take the news.

“Oh,” the teen said softly, his eyes feeling heavy. He tried to think of something else to say, but he was far too exhausted to think of a reply, trying to cling into consciousness, sleep finally claiming him.

 _A month_ , he thought while he fell into a deep sleep. _A month…_


	4. God Help you Dumb Boy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _WHERE ARE YOU, MAGGOT BOY?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bastian learns something weird, Lazaro loses control, Parker misses what he has lost and Owen loses it.

For a second Bastian thought he was going to have a heart attack, his chest burning as he crawled backwards away from his bed until he clashed with the wall, but he kept crawling anyways.

Several minutes passed before Bastian realized that Owen was not moving, his figure still lying at the other side of his bed. Was he dead?

 _Is that even possible?_ Bastian pondered as he had no idea what to do, but he had to make sure. Slowly, he shakily got up with his back glued to the wall eyeing Owen the entire time; sweat freckled down his forehead as he began to slowly and very carefully walk around the bed, Owen being at the opposite side of the bed.

The teenager tried to not make sound, but his breathing was too loud (something he didn’t notice), his heart beat harder with every step he made towards Owen.

 

He stood at the side of Owen’s fainted figure, Bastian had no idea if it was safe to move him or not. He seemed pretty out of it, but the teenager had to make sure. Nervously, he dared to nudge the redhead a little with his bare foot.

He didn’t do it more than a couple of times, flinching and stumbling backwards falling on his butt when Owen snored softly.

It was when he was on the floor he realized that there was a pool of drool just right under Owen’s mouth.

 _He’s asleep…?_ He noticed there was some blood coming out of Owen’s back, it wasn’t much but it seemed like he had been in a fight earlier.

Bastian buried his face on his hands, unsure of what he should do next. A serial killer was on his room, should he kill him, stop him, tell anyone…?

He had little time, the sleeping killer could wake up at any moment and then Bastian would really be fucked.

_What do I do? What do I do…_

 

Bastian slowly got up from the floor after he made a decision. He couldn’t deal with this on his own, he _had_ to call the police but first he needed to make sure Owen couldn’t hurt anyone if he was to wake up.

Luckily enough the teenager had rope on his closet, sport supplies coach asked him to buy some days before (God bless forgetfulness).

Silently taking the rope Bastian turned to Owen breathing harshly as he walked slowly towards the small teen, easily towering him.

_Okay, okay, no big deal, it’s just like that time we tied Mickey to that pole…_

 

He began to crouch slowly, the rope on his hands shaking violently while he held his breath ready to tie him up.

A hand shoot up to grab the rope, Bastian gasping and freezing in place as Owen grabbed the rope tightly on his right palm. The small teen pulled the rope towards him harshly, pulling Bastian along with him to the ground; he twisted the rope around Bastian neck and tugged the taller teen towards him, his head on Owen’s chest as he began to regain more and more consciousness.

“Mmmmmto slow…” the teen slurred, his head still buzzing from the tranquilizers.

“Come on Bastian… you’re a bad host…” he chuckled softly, Bastian trying to squeeze his way out of the rope being held against his throat to no avail.

“Wh-why are you here?” Bastian coughed, the rope making it way harder for him to speak properly.

“It isn’t personal, just needed a temporary hideout; no big deal.”  Owen fingers were shaking slightly, damn tranquilizer.

“Who… are you…? Why-why are you doing this?!”

Owen sighed, letting go of the rope.

 

Bastian scrambled to his feet as he pressed his back against the wall, staring at the teenager who had the rope on his hands.

“Wh-“

“My name is Owen Nathaniel Wright, I’m fifteen years old,” Bastian eyes went wide as Owen kept spewing his personal information. “Scorpio. I was born and raised in Boulder, Colorado; I like reading and cats. I _don’t_ like dogs,” Owen scowled. “Oh also, I’m a violent criminal.”

Owen looked up to Bastian with a wicked smile.

“As for why I am doing this…” He chuckled. “I just want to mess with Maggot Boy, is all.”

“Maggot Boy…?”

“Don’t worry your pretty head about it, Baz. You’ll find out soon enough, I promise!” Owen jumped to his feet, making his way to the window where he climbed through.

“Owen, wait!”

The teen turned around with curiosity. “You…” Bastian took a deep breath. “I haven’t broken my promise. I haven’t told anyone.”

“…Okay, whatever.” He began climbing off the window but was called once again by Bastian. “You have to respect the-“

“Respect the promise, yeah whatever, I have respected it okay?! Just shut up and go back to sleep or whatever.” Owen made an annoyed gesture with his hand. “See ya later, Baz.”

With that the teen jumped off the window, not knowing that the individual that had beat the shit out of him was actually Davey Jones, leaving him confused at Bastian’s questions. But whatever, that didn’t matter now; he needed to make sure his plans to attract Parker’s attention worked.

 

Bastian slid to the floor unsure of what had just happened. Owen said that he had respected their “deal” (more like threats), but even so Davey and Micah had been attacked a month ago, even leaving Micah on a coma. It probably was mere coincidence, but the thought still terrified Bastian. If Owen didn’t actually mean to attack Davey to spite Bastian, then what would he do when he actually meant to?

He stood on the floor of his bedrooms shaking, trying to process everything that had happened to him, trying to wonder just how he got in that terrible mess.

His phone alarm rang as he was taken out of his panicked trance; it was already time to go to school.

 

\---

 

Owen was pretty restless since he left Bastian’s house, his rash decision of entering the teenager’s house was probably the only reason he wasn’t taken by the woman. Having being chased by the woman brought things into perspective to him; his time was running out.

He barely managed to escape her and he was sure that next time the woman would come even more prepared. She probably was the reason Parker suddenly stopped going out at night; he knew she was coming and that she was dangerous.

The teen was still set on his plan to attract everybody’s attention, he would make _sure_ Parker took notice of him once again; he would get his way no matter what.

 

Owen began to climb one of the buildings in the street before sunrise, making his way in the emergency ladder picking a window at random. Quickly, Owen punched the window breaking it, making his way in before anyone around noticed the sound; once inside Owen didn’t even pay attention to anything in the room, making a beeline to the room he suspected was the bedroom. Not caring a bit about being subtle, he quickly opened the door while he got an army knife from one of his pockets, and made his way to the bed in the center of the room.

The young man sleeping in the room woke all of sudden, not having the chance of screaming when Owen shoved the knife on his throat.

 

\---

 

The sun shined brightly as the birds began to gather on the rooftop, eating the birdseed being thrown at them from one of the corners, one of the birds placed itself on top of Parker’s head, who continued to throw the birdseed at the hungry animals.

The teenager chuckled at the little animal, peering over the edge of the building when he heard the school’s bell ringing.

 

Parker saw how the students gathered to enter the school building, Parker sighing as nostalgia struck him. Not too many months had passed since his death, but he still felt as if several years had passed already, the teen felt like he didn’t belong in that world anymore.

He finally spotted the one person he was looking for; Bastian wasn’t that hard to pin from far anyways, his multicolored hair making him easy to recognize.

 

Parker began looking out for Bastian a week ago after getting tired of not doing anything around the warehouse; as long as Owen was out there Parker had no idea if he actually was harassing Bastian or not. Having following the teenager around however brought Parker way too many memories of back when he was alive and it hurt his heart; he missed how ordinary his life was.

 

“Thought I would find you here.” He heard a voice calling from behind. Parker didn’t have to turn to know who had managed to sneak up to him.

“Hey, Chainey.”

The taller of the two positioned himself alongside Parker, careful to not stand out too much.

“Is this what you have been doing this entire week? Patrol the school?” a pigeon stood on top of Chainey’s head, making itself comfortable while it cooed.

“I’m not patrolling, I’m just making sure Bastian is alright.”

“Bastian? Oh, that guy Owen kidnaped, right?”

Parker nodded slightly.

“Were you two friends?”

 _Friends_.

 

They were friends after all, and they would never be anything more than friends. Parker didn’t exist in Bastian’s world anymore; he was _dead_ to the world and he had to stay that way, away from his family and friends.

Away from Bastian.

 

They would never be more than friends.

 

“Yes.” He replied with a shaky voice. “We… were friends.” His fingers began to shake. “He is my brother’s best friend.”

“Oh,” Chainey replied, Parker having no idea of he was aware of his emotional state. “You have a brother?”

“Yes,” Parker answered thankful of the sudden topic change. “He… is older than me. Actually he hasn’t come to school today,” Parker chuckled slightly. “Typical Davey.”

“You miss them a lot, don’t you?” the pigeon on Chainey’s head accommodated itself once again.

“Well, duh. I mean, that’s my life down there. I can never go back to that! Of course I miss it.”

Parker squinted a little confused that he hadn’t seen Micah, but he shrugged it off. He constantly made a big drama whenever he was sick; he probably had a “cold” or something.

“…Sorry about this Chainey, you can’t miss anyone.”

“Eh, it’s okay.” Chainey shrugged it off, irritating the pigeon on his head prompting it to fly away. “I can’t feel sad, I don’t even know how it was to be alive!” The tall teenager laughed at his own situation, Parker admired that at least Chainey stayed positive about his strange condition.

“I promise you Chainey, after we get Owen we will make him tell us everything he knows about you.”

“Thanks, I appreciate it a lot, Peej. I really do!”

 

Parker’s phone started ringing, the small teenager fidgeting with it slightly surprised.

“Sam…? Why would she-“ He negated with his head, answering the phone.

“Hey Sam, what’s up?”

“PJ, is Chainey with you?” The woman sounded pretty worried.

“Yeah, he is. Why? What happened?” Chainey began to worry when he heard Parker so alarmed.

“You need to come back here, Owen… Owen did something terrible.”

 

\---

 

“Four dead bodies were found this morning, one of them in an alley and the other three in their apartments, the ones killed in their apartments were killed on their sleep, since they were killed in their beds.”

Noah stood in the middle of Lazaro’s personal office, his eyes glued to the sheet of papers he was holding. He was standing in front of Lazaro’s desk, where the man himself listened with his gaze focused on his assistant with his hands intertwined with each other.

“The bodies were mutilated to the point that they were impossible to identify; their identities had been confirmed by their address, they are still investigating the corpse they found in the alley. It is our killer, there was a painted ‘O’ in every scene.”

Noah didn’t take his eyes off the papers as he changed the page.

“Not only that, but a personal message to ‘Maggot Boy’ in every crime scene but the alley. Our people had managed to wash off the messages before anyone could see them, but they took pictures of it.”

 

Unceremoniously, Noah threw the photographs to Lazaro’s desk, the man slowly picking them up and examining them while he frowned in deep concern.

The pictures were gruesome- blood and organs were sprawled on the scene as if Owen had purposefully tried to make the biggest mess he could with what he had, and he had succeeded. The bodies in the picture were mutilated beyond recognition, but the thing that disturbed Lazaro the most how the bodies were untouched.

Owen would eat his victims, and the one that had been found in the alley was eaten alright, but the ones found in their homes weren’t, they were missing no organs and no chunks of flesh.

The message painted with blood on every crime scene was what convinced Lazaro that he had miscalculated the situation greatly.

 

_WHERE ARE YOU, MAGGOT BOY?_

_COME OUT AND PLAY, MAGGOT BOY_

_I WON’T STOP UNTIL I FIND YOU, MAGGOT BOY_

These messages were written with blood on the apartments along with the very characteristic ‘O’; it was undeniable what Owen was trying to get at here.

“Seems like your plan failed.” Noah didn’t even try to be sarcastic or crack at joke at Lazaro’s expense and that truly concerned him. “What now?”

“We…” Lazaro had no idea what to do. Palmer was positive that hiring Marianne back would fix all of his problems, but it seemed like things just managed to get even worse. What now, indeed.

The man stayed silent for several seconds, until Noah began walking towards the exit.

“While you figure out a way to crawl out of this hole I’ll deal with the public; try to make them not panic.”

“…Thanks, Noah.”

“You know, I really need a raise.”

The door closed softly with a click, leaving Lazaro with the gruesome pictures on his desk, drops of blood falling on the photographs.

Lazaro placed a hand on one of his ears getting his fingers drenched in blood. Soon, his nose and mouth began to spill blood as well smearing the desk with his fresh blood; Lazaro quickly got up slightly horrified (“It has never been this bad…”), feeling his knees weak and crumbling to the ground, coughing blood on the carpet.

“F-fuck, fuck!” he hissed as more blood spewed from his mouth, his eyes rolling to the back of his skull, falling on the carpet of his office.

 

\---

 

Parker fingers shook as he grabbed the pictures in his hands, reading the messages over and over again.

_WHERE ARE YOU, MAGGOT BOY?_

“Noah sent these to me about half hour ago… Owen did this last night.”

The teen could feel his mouth shaking as he changed the pictures, going through them several times without realizing.

“I thought that Maria woman was getting rid of him?” Chainey asked, reading the reports that were sent along with the pictures.

“Marianne, and I thought so too. Noah said that she was getting a report ready since she actually crossed paths with him last night.” Samantha passed her fingers through her messy hair. “Until we have her report we have no idea if she was any close to capturing him.”

“Damn, this is gruesome.” Chainey said slightly alarmed at the written report of the situation, still not having seen the pictures (They were still in Parker’s shaky hands.)

“Do you think his encounter with Marianne was what set him off?”

“No.” Parker replied in a dark tone, prompting Samantha and Chainey to turn their gaze at him.

“It’s because of me,” he dropped the pictures without even realizing it, the photographs landing softly on the ground at his feet. “He did this because of me.”

Parker sighed harshly, tears forming at the corners of his eyes.

“It’s my fault.”

 

Samantha got close to the teen, placing her hand on his shoulder trying to comfort him. “PJ, this isn’t your fault at all. Owen did this because-“

“No!” Parker gave a step back getting away from Samantha’s hand, crossing his arms and clutching them strongly as he continued to step away from the two.

“This… I thought I could take a break, I thought I could pretend nothing happened, b-but-“ He felt his knees shaking. “He killed because of me. He killed because I stopped playing his ridiculous game. B-because of me those people were killed.”

When his back touched the wall he slid down to it, curling into himself as tears began to spill from his eyes, clutching his own chest. His scar burned like it had never burned, sending a terrible burning sensation through his entire body.

“I- It’s my fault. This is all my fault.” Parker began to sob softly. “It’s my fault Owen killed those people, it’s my fault Bastian was-“

His eyes widened in sudden realization.

If Owen wanted to hurt him, he would go straight to Bastian.

 

Parker jumped right up to his feet running as fast as his legs could take him to the exit.

“Parker, wait!” Samantha yelled at the teenager, but he simply ignored her as he made his way out of the warehouse.

“Chainey-“

“I know,” the taller of the two replied as he grabbed the metallic back as he began to chase Parker but as soon as Chainey left the warehouse, the teenager was already gone.

“Shit…!” Chainey muttered, checking his clock to make sure what hour it was (it was Parker’s idea, that way they would knew exactly how much time had passed since they started their rounds).

It was still early, school hours in fact; Chainey was pretty sure Parker had gone to check on Bastian, so if he made haste he would be able to catch up with the panicked teenager.

“Chainey?” Samantha called from inside the warehouse, observing how Chainey still hadn’t left the lot.

“He is going to the high-school,” Chainey muttered.

“I… can’t remember where that is.”

 

\---

 

Parker didn’t even think about how it was that he reached the school grounds so fast and how he risked being spotted by anyone in plain day, but he didn’t care. He only cared about reaching Bastian, stopping just outside the school grounds right outside the metallic fence. His fingers curled around the fence links, deep breaths as he didn’t know if he should trespass and get a closer look.

It was no longer necessary, the bell ringing as many students began to exit the building. Realizing he was in full view of everyone, Parker silently made his way to behind the bleachers on the school’s football field, peeking through the seats to see if he could see if anyone was approaching.

He saw a trio approach the bleachers while joking to themselves, prompting the Aware to quickly climb to the top of the trees behind him. Once hidden he tried to find a way to climb around the trees to get a better view of who was in the field, the smell of smoke reaching his nose, prompting him to look down.

“Come on Alan, what did she say?”

“She said,” the black haired teen took a deep puff of smoke, releasing it with his mouth. “That you are a fat piece of shit and that your dick is bent up and weird.”

 _Alan?_ Parker peeked closer making sure he was still hidden. He recognized the three students as his bullies back when he was alive, prompting the teen to softly grunt when he remembered how they used to treat him.

 _Who cares now,_ he thought. Certainly not him; that was in the past, and Parker had far more important things to deal with than his bullies.

“Hey Alan, apparently the princess woke up from that coma yesterday or whatever.”

“Really?” he took another breath from his cigarette, spitting the smoke out. “I thought he was going to die.” Alan said this in such a careless manner, it made Parker sick.

“Man, how come he didn’t get eaten? I thought that fucker weirdass freak killer ate anyone he killed.”

That certainly picked Parker interest; it wasn’t hard to realize that they were talking about Owen.

“No, are you stupid? The only reason he didn’t get eaten was because Davey Jones was with him.” He twirled the cigarettes between his fingers. “Davey beat the shit out of the killer or something.”

 

_Davey? As in, Davey?_

The teenager felt horrified and yet impressed. Horrified at the fact that Owen was so close to Davey, but incredibly _impressed_ that Davey had managed to stop him from killing someone, it was more than Parker had been able to do in all these months.

“Whatever man, little fucker got what he deserved.”

“You are just mad Davey kicked the shit out of you for nagging the squirt.”

“Well, _yeah_ , why does he give a shit so much anyways?”

Parker had enough of that conversation, he was there for a reason and it was to look out for Bastian. Alan’s intrusion has made him lose sight of his goal, and he was ready to go back to his mission.

“Probably cus’ it was his dead’s brother best friend, man.”

“Yeah, man. Ever since he died Davey hangs out with him far more.”

“Whatever,” Alan tossed his cigarette to the grass, grinding his foot against it. “Let’s go man; I know this one place that has amazing burgers.”

 

They left the bleachers calmly, letting Parker climb down the tree and sitting with his back against it.

_Oh god…_

Micah had been hurt, and he had been in a goddamned _coma_ and Parker had no idea of it; they had been fucking _attacked_ by Owen and Parker had just been _sitting_ in the warehouse doing absolutely nothing.

Things just kept getting worse and worse, and it was his entire fault, his negligence had allowed Owen to just run amok harming every person he knew.

“Hey Bastian!” he heard a voice call from beyond the bleachers.

Shaky, Parker stood up getting close to the bleachers, peeking from beyond them as he saw some students standing around.

“Gonna stay for practice this afternoon?”

“Sorry, no. I’m going to the hospital today.”

 

It had been months since Parker had saw Bastian from so close, and he still felt like he was way too far away from him. He wanted to scream at him, to hug him; Bastian was a reminder to Parker of how normal his life used to be, of what could have _been_.

“I get it, man. Say hi to Davey from me!”

Bastian started to leave, Parker silently following behind as he tried to organize his thoughts.

 _Micah and Davey were attacked by Owen,_ he kept close to Bastian, the teenager unable to realize he was being followed. _Micah and Davey were attacked by Owen and I didn’t find out until now. What is wrong with me?_ Bastian had reached the hospital, but Parker knew he couldn’t follow him inside. Instead, he climbed around the building via trees. Luckily, the room where Micah had been wasn’t that far from the ground floor, it wasn’t hard for Parker to find it.

 _He was in a coma. A coma! And what do I do? Sit around doing nothing.”_ Parker shook his head. _They are alive, at least. They are all alive…_

He heard a door open, prompting the teenager (appropriately hiding on a tree) to snap out of his thoughts and look towards the room.

 

Davey and Bastian stood around talking a little, Davey was sporting a Mohawk which made Parker smile (he had always talked about how he wanted one); Bastian seemed to be worried but calmed.

It was then that his eyes fell to the person on the bed; Micah seemed tired but in good shape, as far as Parker could see. Seeing the three of them on that hospital bed made Parker’s heart ache, he just wanted to climb to the window and say hello to all of them.

 _I can’t do that_ , he told to himself as much as it hurt.

 _They moved on_.

 

Parker cuddled against the tree branch, staring with sleepy eyes; he couldn’t hear what they were saying from his position but that didn’t matter, the only thing that mattered is that they were all alive, they were _safe._

The scene gave Parker a grim reminder that he was dead to them; he simply didn’t exist in their world anymore and they kept moving on.

_Life must go on._

\---

 

Owen huffed as he began to wander aimlessly around the rooftops, chuckling whenever he thought of the little deed from the previous night. That had to attract Maggot boy, the only thing Owen needed to do was to find him; but that would be easy.

Things would go back to normal real quick.

 

Owen didn’t have to wander much to find Parker sitting in a rooftop silently, seemingly following someone else on his own; Owen didn’t pay much attention to this, grinning with joy as he began to silently chase Parker.

Parker was moving fast, but he still hadn’t noticed the killer that was chasing him, Owen wondering what exactly the teen could be doing, but that wasn’t his problem. Things would go back to normal, he kept telling himself.

 

Parker stopped, staring at the street down below giving Owen an opportunity to approach him silently from behind; his hands shaking from the excitement of facing Maggot Boy once again.

He stopped in his tracks when he heard Parker silently cry out.

“Bastian…” he muttered, burying his face on his palms. “I miss you so… so much.”

Owen stared at Parker confused, his gaze now focusing on the street below them; looking down he saw the pretty boy, _Bastian,_ walk around the street.

“I just…” Parker continued to whisper to himself (or so he thought), kneeling and sobbing softly.

 

Owen was confused at first, sudden realization crashing down to him forcing the teen to cover his mouth to not scream. His eyes wide, Owen ran away from the rooftop no one being the wiser.

 _They are not just friends,_ Owen’s thoughts screamed at him as he ran away from everything.

 _He… he just-_ Owen couldn’t even think straight, entering the apartment he has been living in for a week now (he had to keep moving), pacing back and forth pulling his own hair, his eyes still wide open.

“Bastian, _Bastian,_ ” he kept repeating to himself.

Of course, it has _always_ been Bastian. Why wouldn’t him? He was extremely well looking, athletic and incredibly charismatic. Of course Parker would fall for him. Of course Parker would _love_ him.

Who wouldn’t love him?

 

Owen gaze fell on the picture that was pinned on the wall, and he felt so much _anger._ Why was Bastian there? What right did he have to be there?

What right did he have to be the one Parker was in love with?

Owen picked up a hunting knife, stabbing the photograph as hard as he could, gasping in exhaustion when the deed was done. He slid down to the floor, curling into himself as his cats began to approach him, circling around him purring as he began to shake.

 

The knife laid there perforating the photograph, Bastian’s face being sliced by the blade.


	5. Teenagers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Is this why he likes you so much?! Because you are just someone everybody loves, right! That’s why. Everybody loves you so much, Bastian, you just can’t help it, can you?!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Micah tries to cope, Parker sets on a goal, Bastian begins to understand and Owen goes off the deep end.

Opening the door to his room, the teenager carefully laid down to his big red bed, sighing in comfort when he did so. It was strange, the hospital bed was far more comfortable than his, but lying on his own mattress made him feel at ease. 

Micah’s room seemed to be in the same state that it was before he had the accident, if anything it seemed a little bit tidier, he remembered he had clothes lying around in the floor.

“Ugh,” grunted the teenager covering his face with a pillow, he couldn’t believe he had been in a coma for a _month_ , to him it was as if only one day had passed.

“The things you were carrying that day are in your desk,” his father nonchalantly said from the door. “Your room stayed the same.”

“I’m surprised,” Micah replied with the pillow still softly resting against his face. “I expected to see this place made into a personal library or something.”

“I was going to give it one more week.” Replied his father stoically.

 

Darius was a strange person, Micah sometimes didn’t even know if he was being sarcastic or not and right now it was one of those times.

 “Yeah, whatever; you won’t get rid of me that easy.”

 _Easy? More like fucking terrifying,_ the teen thought to himself.

Darius didn’t reply, instead starting to walk away in the hallway, making Micah feel a little bit offended.

“Hey!” Micah called back to his father, him silently returning to his son’s room without saying a thing.

“Are…” Micah felt the words caught in his throat, struggling to get them out. “Are we going to talk about what happened? Like, at all?”

“That you were in a coma?”

“Yes, that I was in a fucking _coma_ , dad; that I could have _died_.” Micah threw the pillow to the floor. “Like, there is absolutely nothing you can do now that can beat that I almost _died_. Nothing! Not even making me pick up dog crap can beat this!”

Micah covered his face with his palms in frustration, his body still sore from having been lying on a bed immobile for a month.

“You haven’t said anything ever since I woke up in the hospital. But I’m not surprised, you don’t care anyways.”

 

“You,” Darius voice changed, it seemed like he was, god forbid, _worried_. “You honestly think that I didn’t _care_?”

“I…” Micah rubbed his eyes with his palms. “I don’t know?”

Awkward silence followed; with Darius silently leaving the doorframe Micah didn’t even realize it. He was far too tired for this bullshit, his eyes feeling heavy as the teenager slowly began to doze off, and the last thing he processed was someone carefully closing the door of his room.

 _Huh, Walter must be back from his holiday_ , Micah thought before he finally fell asleep.

 

\---

 

Walking through the school hallways after being bedridden for a month was a different experience for Micah; it was as if it was still in a dream he couldn’t wake up from. People didn’t seem to pay him any attention, and he thanked that; Davey was the one that became even more popular after becoming some sort of hero for saving Micah’s ass from the killer.

Davey could have all the attention as far as he cared, Micah just wanted his life to go back to normal.

 

The teenager soon regretted not having listened to his father when he suggested it was better for him to just stay home; in the middle of class Micah already felt vertigo in his desk as well as his legs shaking.

“Can… Can I leave?”

Picking up his backpack Micah groggily left the classroom, rubbing his eyes imagining his father being “I told you so” when he got back.

Before leaving the school, Micah entered the bathroom figuring cleaning his face would help him stay awake. He opened the faucet, splashing cold water on his pale face.

“Oh, I thought you were dead.” Said a voice as the door to the bathroom opened.

It was Alan along with his friends, Micah turned at them not sure exactly how to answer, he would normally tell them to go fuck themselves but he was far too exhausted.

“We made bets you know; the entire school made bets.” Alan smirked as his friends behind him chuckled, cleaning their hands from mud and dirt. “On how long till your dad pulled the plug on you.”

Micah felt his stomach go cold; he turned around to go back to cleaning his hands nervously trying to ignore Alan.

“You know, Blake’s dad works with someone that works with your dad, says that he heard your dad saying how he was glad he finally would get rid of you,” Alan began to approach Micah’s dangerously, every step he made Micah scrubbed his hands harder and harder.

“We were worried we were going to lose our punching bag.”

“Fuck you…” Micah whispered under his breath, eliciting a “Oooh” reaction from Alan’s friends, Alan himself smirking.

“Oh, what was that? Did the princess want to say something?”

Micah bit his lip, the water from the faucet still running his hands under the stream.

“Fuck you, Alan. I don’t need any of this bullshit, leave me the fuck alone.”

“Aha, take a look at this. The princess grew _balls_ , about time too!” Alan laughed, giving a slight nudge to Micah’s shoulder. “I guess not hanging around with your little dead girlfriend helped you grow up.”

Micah eyes widened still refusing to stare at Alan, his heartbeat increasing with every word the teenager spouted.

“Maybe you thought dying would help you see him again? Is that was it was? Were you oh so desperate, that you wandered around while the killer was loose?” Micah’s fists clenched.

“Were you like, ‘Oh killer please kill me! Please eat me so I can see my gay girlfriend again! Please, I love Parker so much-‘”

 

Micah punched Alan’s cheek as hard as he was able to (which wasn’t that hard), making the taller teen to stumble backwards as his friends ran to Micah, the largest one shoving him to the ground as he started to punch Micah’s face again and again, Alan’s other lackey kicking the pale teen in the ribs repeatedly.

After several seconds, they both stopped as Alan kneeled right next to Micah. His face was terribly bruised, a split lip and bloody nose decorating his face, bruises already forming in his face.

“Micah, that didn’t even _hurt_.” Alan hissed at Micah, him panting trying to get off his bully’s grasp but failing terribly at this, his green eyes staring back to Alan with hate.

“You know, you won’t have Jones to protect you every day, especially now that he is the local hero. He doesn’t give a shit about you, Micah. No _one_ does, not even your goddamned dad.”

He stood up once again, his shadow looming over Micah’s beaten up frame in the floor.

“That’s really sad, Micah. If you ask me, that killer was going to do you a favor, too bad Davey fucked it up.”

The largest of them finally let go of Micah, laughing along with his friends as they began to slowly exit the bathroom; Micah supported himself with his elbows grunting when he realized Alan came back.

“Oh, yeah!” Alan recalled, smirking down at Micah.

With great force, Alan kicked the teen in the stomach knocking the air out of Micah, forcing the teen to lie on the floor gasping for air in terrible pain.

“That’s for punching me.”

The three of them left laughing, leaving Micah lying on the floor desperately trying to breathe. Every gasp hurt, his entire body screaming in pain with every movement he made.

After a while, he decided to just lay there. He didn’t care anymore; his bones ached, his sight was hazy and everything hurt, not even his body but he felt the weight of the world making it impossible for him stand up.

 _Maybe he should have pulled the plug_ , he thought closing his eyes as his breathing steadied slowly, the cold tile brushing against his sore reddened cheek.

 

\---

 

Parker entered the warehouse at dawn, tiptoeing carefully while wondering if his two roommates were asleep. He hadn’t return until that moment, having been out all night making sure Owen wouldn’t get near to Bastian but it appeared like Owen didn’t do anything at all that night. Good, it gave Parker more time to think in a permanent solution to the predicament.

Parker took his shoes off making sure make minimum noise, making his way to the fridge. Opening it, the teenager grabbed a box with a kidney on it, chewing on it nonchalantly making way to his room, grabbing his trusty tire iron.

Finishing the kidney, the teen wiped his slightly bloodied hands on his dark pants making his way to the door, his sneakers on one hand and his pipe on another.

“Parker?”

 

The aware turned around to see Samantha, her hair a mess and with bags under her big eyes, worry on her face.

“Hey…” He replied guiltily, not meeting her gaze and instead staring at the floor.

“Did you just come back?”

“I’m not staying. I… I have to go.”

“Chainey looked for you all day, but when he finally found the school you weren’t there anymore.”

“Sorry for leaving so abruptly,” he clutched the sneakers on his hands, still not looking up. “I…”

“What are going to do?” Samantha big eyes stared right at him, the teenager feeling even smaller, biting his lip while crouching slightly. He felt so guilty.

“I messed up.” Parker replied his voice cracking and low, he looked so vulnerable. “A lot of people are dead because of the decisions I made. My friends were attacked without me even realizing it; the least I could do is look out for them.”

Parker dropped his sneakers on the ground, crouching to put them on his feet as Samantha approached him from behind.

“Let us help you, PJ, we are your friends.” She placed her small hand on his shoulder.

“…I- I have to figure things out for myself.” He finished putting his shoes on, prompting him to stand up and run outside away from Samantha.

“Peej!” PJ, wait!” she called out for him, but Parker didn’t stop running away from the warehouse to who knows where.

The young woman sighed, sitting with her knees near her face as the sun rose.

 

Parker felt guilty for leaving Samantha once again without even telling her where she was going once again, his head was drowning with several thoughts that didn’t make any bit of sense. He needed to get his feelings in order- what he needed to do was make sure Bastian was okay, Micah and Davey as well. The three of them hanged out pretty much at school for the major part of the day, it wouldn’t be hard to scout the school grounds.

The Aware perched himself at the rooftop of one of buildings in the area, having a clear view of everybody that entered and wandered around the area; Parker simply stared and waited.

 

\---

 

The bell rang, the students exiting the building after school was over, mostly just goofing around the football field behind the school.

Owen had already been in the school since morning, neither him nor Parker aware of the other intentions. The killer played with a knife in his hands- even if he wasn’t planning on running into anyone that morning he knew that he needed to be prepared for absolutely anything.

He observed from far away how the students left the building slowly, but he didn’t care about them, he fiddled with the blade between his fingers while he waited for his target.

And there he was, Bastian Nightingale.

 

Owen bit his lip drawing a little bit of blood, hissing softly as he saw the tall teenager wander around the football field, a redhead slightly shorter than him happily prancing and talking to Bastian. He couldn’t hear what they were saying, prompting Owen to move closer, carefully towards them; it wasn’t that hard, the bushes near them were great camouflage.

“Coach is already going to get me to play in the next game! Isn’t that amazing?” the redhead pranced happily around Bastian, him giving a genuine smile (a lovely smile).

“Wow, already McGee? That was fast! Congrats!” Bastian chuckled.

“Yeah, I can’t wait for the next game! Are you going to join it, too?”

“Oh, no. I… I still don’t think I can play.”

“Awh, that’s too bad, Baz, the team always won because of you!”

“Really? Nah, everybody in the team is really good. It’s just-“

“Hey Bastian; what’s up McGee!” Davey approached from behind, waving to the pair in the field.

“Hey Davey, what’s up! Wanna come to football practice with us?” waved the redhead excitedly.

“Nah, I am still pretty much grounded, I can’t go anywhere after school. Whatever!” Davey shrugged happily as he joined his friends to the bleachers.

 

Owen knew who Davey was- he was Parker’s older brother, but the teenager cursed himself when he realized that Davey was also the person that beat the shit out of him with a hammer about a month ago. Anger rose on his stomach as he continued to stare at Davey, in reality Owen never meant to attack Davey in specific, he just happened to be there at the wrong time; but it didn’t matter anymore, he would deal with him later.

“Did you do Miss Bennett’s homework? I didn’t understand a bit of it.”

“I did it, but I’m not sure if I got it right.”

“She doesn’t check the homework until the class is almost over, anyways, we got time-“

Davey spaced out, staring at something in the distance his mouth slightly agape.

“Hey, isn’t that…?” He stood up, his friends puzzled as they looked at the same direction.

“Oh hey, it’s Micah! Hello Micah!” McGee waved over to the teenager who was exiting the school, unaware that he seemed to be limping.

“Oh, shit-“ Davey quickly got up with Bastian following towards the small teenager, and McGee followed as well slightly confused as to why they were so worried.

He realized why when they got closer to him; Micah was in terrible state with his face bruised and with traces of blood, he was limping and he looked even paler than normal.

“Holy shit, Micah, what the fuck-“ Micah knees went weak, Bastian and Davey helping him up towards the bleachers.

“Easy-“ they sat the teenager down at the bleachers, careful to not hurt him anymore than he was; Micah cringed, sitting hurt too much and he carefully reclined himself to lie on the bleachers.

Owen could recognize that boy very well alright- he was the teen he was going to murder had Davey not interfered. By how Bastian and Davey were treating him, it seemed like this kid had also some sort of link to Parker as well.

 _Well, Am I lucky or what?_ Owen thought of himself, silently observing the situation.

“Micah, what happened?”

_Micah? What a ridiculous name._

“Did… did Alan do this to you?” Davey asked with lingering anger on his voice.

“Y-yes…” Micah breathed out, cringing with every word.

“We need to tell the teachers, Davey. This has gone way too far.” Owen was surprised at how genuinely worried Bastian sounded; as far as Owen knew, people like Bastian didn’t give a shit for people like Micah and himself. Why would they? They were popular and had everything handed in a silver platter- there was no reason for them to be anything but fucking assholes.

And yet he wasn’t like that.

 

“You’re right. I’ll bring the teacher, you stay here with him.” Davey practically began to run towards the school, leaving Micah alone with Bastian and McGee (and Owen).

“Why are you even here, man? You should be resting after what happened.” Bastian realized the teen was shivering, he took off his own sweater placing it as a blanket on top of Micah.

“T-thanks,” Micah gently muttered, being in far too much pain to call out how tacky the sweater’s design was. “I… I didn’t want to feel so… useless.”

Micah was terribly aware of how ridiculous that was, he had the perfect excuse to miss on classes and yet he decided it was a perfectly good idea to actually go.

“Nah man, you were in a coma! Like, that’s intense!” McGee contributed trying to cheer Micah up but very obviously failing.

“Man, you aren’t useless- you managed to survive an attack from… from that guy.” Bastian became uncomfortable, shifting silently on his place.

“But… it’s different,” the light of the day hurt Micah eyes, forcing him to close them to prevent from getting a headache. “You… survived in your own. Davey had to save me; if he hadn’t been there I would be dead.” He hissed, a sharp pain shooting in his forehead.

“Don’t think so low of yourself,” Bastian sighed thoughtfully, getting nervous as he remembered his own experience and just how Owen kept harassing him. “There is nothing you could have done in that situation. It’s no use to think so much about it, it isn’t good for you.”

“Yeah, listen to Baz! He is really smart and stuff, he knows how to deal with things.”

“Huh? Nah, I’m just telling him how it is.” The teenager’s face reddened in slight embarrassment, chuckling a little.

“I need to-“ Micah took the sweater off, gently giving it to Bastian as he supported himself with his elbows, trying to sit up.

“Whoa Micah, easy-“ Bastian helped the small teenager sit straight up McGee doing the same, Micah using them for support to steady himself up.

“Feeling better?” Bastian placed his hand on Micah’s shoulder, who was still hissing between his teeth.

“Yeah no, not really. Not at all, actually.”

 

One of the teachers, someone Micah couldn’t recognize came running to them at the bleachers. There, after she saw Micah’s state and after the four of them told them what happened she called out even more teachers Micah still didn’t recognize, and they proceeded to call his father who in turn proceeded to make a big scandal out of it; after that Davey and Bastian weren’t needed anymore, Micah’s butlers (who appeared before his father did) proceeded to take him to the hospital once again.

Owen became aware of Parker’s presence nearby, it wasn’t that hard to realize that he was doing the same thing Owen was, but with a far different reason. However, lucky for Owen, Parker decided to follow Davey back home, leaving him to follow Bastian to his house.

 

The football captain was pulled into an alley, an experience far too familiar for him for the past months. This time around however, Bastian was violently thrown into the floor by Owen, unable to scream due to the short teen slightly strangling him.

“I missed this,” Owen said, his general demeanor being even more disturbing than normal, Bastian noted.

Bastian had a hard time breathing, sputtering and gasping while Owen kept strangling him.

“Why are you like this?” Owen asked with no smile on his face as he pressed slightly harder, Bastian kicking with no results under him.

“W-w-wha…” Bastian choked, Owen offended at the fact that he didn’t seem to understand what he was talking about.

“Stop pretending! Why are you like _this_?” Owen bared his teeth at the teenager, the smell of dried blood filling Bastian’s nose.

“I- d-don-“

“Shut up!” Owen slammed Bastian’s head against the pavement, provoking the teen to see stars.

“Why do you act so nice? Why… who the hell do you think you are?!” He pressed slightly more, provoking Bastian to claw against Owen’s back to no avail.

“Is this why he likes you so much?! Because you are just someone everybody loves, right! That’s why. Everybody loves you so much, Bastian, you just can’t _help_ it, can you?!”

 

Bastian had absolutely no idea what Owen was talking about, and it terrified him; Owen was very obviously furious at him but he couldn’t understand _why_ and why all of sudden.

“You are not like them, right. You know you are supposed to be an awful person, and you aren’t, you _aren’t at all_. That’s why he loves you, right? That’s why he fucking loves you so much.”

At this point, Bastian couldn’t understand anything that Owen was saying, grasping for air that didn’t come as Owen kept pinning him, his fingernails digging on Bastian’s neck.

“What right do you think you have? How, just how dare you-“

His eyes widened when felt Bastian go limp on his arms.

 

“Huh,” Owen muttered, not exactly sure if he had actually killed the teenager. Whatever it was he didn’t bother checking before he began to drag the body to his hideout; Bastian softly grunted was all the confirmation Owen needed to know that he didn’t actually kill the teenager. He didn’t care at the moment, anyways; as far as he knew Bastian could be dead and he wouldn’t give a shit.

 _I wouldn’t give a shit,_ Owen repeated to himself even if couldn’t get rid of the mental image of Bastian helping Micah and giving him his sweater, running to his side when he realized how hurt his friend was; the fact that he didn’t completely ignore Micah for another people.

Because that is how Bastian was.

 

Owen bit his lip in anger, his chest burning with indecision of what to do; but whatever it was, it would end that night.


	6. Monster

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I am a monster.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Owen and Bastian talk.

His knees hurt, blood gently dripping from his right one into the pavement with bruises forming around the cut; his elbows and hands were pink the first layer of skin being scrapped off, regaining consciousness slowly he noticed his head was slightly bleeding. Curious, he touched the wound on his head only to hiss when he felt the pain, his fingers now covered with his own blood.

His friends formed a circle around him, staring down at his pathetic wounded form with pale and worried faces; giving a glance he realized his bicycle laid in the side of the road completely wrecked.

“Don’t move,” he heard one of the figures looming over him say when he tried to move, obeying if only because moving was too painful for him.

“Your mom is coming.” He heard another one say, the others whispering and making way for the panicked woman. She seemed alarmed, crouching at his side.

 

“Bastian! What happened?” His mother asked, her brown eyes inspecting her son from head to toe trying to find more injuries.

“I crashed,” he answered his voice tired, trying to remember the previous events. “My bicycle’s wheel burst and I crashed, I think?”

“Yeah, I got it on camera.” One of his friends spoke up, not sure if he should feel proud or ashamed.

“We need to take you to the hospital, now!” his mother ordered, instructing the teenagers to help him stand up.

“Mom, I’m okay.” He answered as his friends put his arms around their backs, supporting him as he tried to walk. “It’s just a scratch.”

“I don’t care! I’ll drive you to the hospital now if it is necessary.”

His friends deposited him in the car seat, his mother putting the security belt on him (his fingers were too dirty with blood).

Her fingers brushed on his face, causing a tingling sensation.

They were warm.

 

\---

 

The coldness and slight wetness of the floor was the first thing Bastian became aware of, his fingers and back touching the wooden floor as he noticed how the environment in general was cold as well, with a slight breeze coming from somewhere.

Next he opened his eyes, realizing that he was in a very unfamiliar place.

An apartment room it seemed, the walls and ceiling covered with old washed out purple wallpaper with holes, the walls having craters and dentures provoked by what Bastian imagined was someone hitting them with a hammer.

He took a breath, his throat crying in pain as he did so; he sat straight with his back against the cold wall his chest aching. Bastian examined himself- his clothes were dirtied and scrapped, as if someone dragged him across the floor.

 

A meow snapped the teenager from his trance, the source being a small cat that was staring at him across the room.

“Cat…?” The little animal (who strangely seemed like it was scowling at him) got closer to Bastian, the teenager slowly raising his hand not knowing if he should pet it or not.

 

“Don’t touch him!” yelled a voice from the door.

Owen stood on the portal of the room; Bastian had never seen the small killer so exhausted, if that was even possible. His childlike features stood out in a disturbing way, he was far too young.

“Vronsky hasn’t eaten today…” Owen eyed the cat sadly. “He tends to get a little mean.”

Bastian just stared at Owen for several seconds not sure if he should even say anything at all, Owen not even bothering to look straight at Bastian.

“Are you going to kill me?” Bastian finally asked, catching Owen’s attention. Considering the question, Bastian seemed calm, exhausted more than anything.

Owen shrugged, “I don’t know,” another cat passed between his legs, purring as it did so. “Depends.”

“On what?” More than horrified, the teenager sounded curious as to what could prompt Owen into killing him.

“On his reaction, of course.”

“His reaction? Who are you talking about?”

“Maggot Boy.”

 

“Maggot Boy?”

“God, what are you, a fucking broken record? Yes, Maggot Boy, the asshole that keeps jumping around in the street while trying to chase me; Maggot Boy!”

Bastian blinked surprised at the confirmation that Maggot Boy was an actual individual that existed and not just an internet urban legend. What did he have to do with Maggot Boy, however?

“He… has been chasing you?”

“God, you are so out of the goddamn loop. Okay, recap time Baz, and pay attention because I am not going to repeat this again.” Owen rolled his eyes, annoyed that he had to explain what was pretty obvious to him.

“I have been killing people for a while and the Institution, yes the Lazaro Palmer institution, sent him to catch me, so for all this time Maggot Boy has been chasing me but he hasn’t been able to actually catch me, and here we are now.” Owen lifted his arms in a sarcastic gesture, rolling his eyes once again.

“What does that have to do with me?”

“Oh, you don’t know, do you?” Owen lips twisted into a rather horrific smile. “Well, I won’t spoil you things. I’ll rather have you find out in your own.”

 

Before Bastian could reply with anything, Owen threw his hands in the air, practically yelling.

“Anyways, enough about that, let’s talk!”

The small teenager began to walk towards Bastian, causing him to cringe softly.

“Oh come on Baz, I don’t have anything on me. I won’t hurt you.”

“If you get closer, I-“

“Oh come on, Bastian, I have managed to knock you out several times in the past weeks. Don’t pretend that you can fight me off.”

Bastian bit his lip feeling embarrassed at how right Owen was; even if he was taller than the killer Owen still was incredibly strong, there was no way he would be able to fight his way out of this.

“Come on Baz,” Owen said sitting at the teenager’s side, not actually facing him. “Why did you help that guy today?”

 

“What?” Bastian asked in confusion mixed with horror as he realized Owen knew what happened earlier that day.

“That kid that got beaten up today, why did you help him?”

“I, how-“ Bastian’s fist clenched as he began to shake not sure what emotion he was feeling at the moment, his eyes were wide open and he felt his stomach burn. “Because that’s the right thing to do?” he said in anger.

“Oh, fuck the ‘it’s the right thing to do’ bullshit. People like you don’t actually do anything like that.” Owen’s voice volume began to rise, as he was starting to get annoyed. “Why did you do it, seriously? What is the actual real reason you did it?”

“People like me? What the hell-“

“You know very well what I am talking about. People like _you_ , people that can get anything they want in life and have already a very successful life in front of them without even fucking having to _try_ for it.” The two of them faced each other, both getting very visibly upset by the other’s answers.

“You don’t know me at all, Owen. You don’t know if I have it difficult, you don’t-“

“Oh, shut the fuck up!” Owen shouted, standing up looming over Bastian who was already starting to get agitated.

“Do you think you know what it is like? Do you have any idea of what struggling is? ‘Oh woe me, I have way too many dates for prom, I don’t know who to pick!’ Are you shitting me?” Owen shouted as he bared his teeth growling to the teenager; Bastian got pretty upset himself prompting him to stand up, even if he managed to loom over Owen, the small teenager still had dominance over the situation.

“I know your kind. You pretend to be nice, everybody fucking loves you and think you to be a goddamned saint, and yet you treat others like absolute shit. I know what people like you have done…”

“I have never done anything like that.” Bastian answered, his voice firm as he tried to appear bigger (Owen was still pretty terrifying, as small as he was.)

“I _know._ ” Owen spat the question with absolute hate. “ _Why?”_

Bastian stared in angered confusion without saying anything, prompting Owen to ask again this time louder.

“You didn’t treat him with disrespect, you- you helped him. You could have hit him, you could have hurt him even more and yet you _didn’t_. Why?”

“I…” Bastian’s answer lingered on his mouth, as if he was trying to find the exact answer as to why he wasn’t like the stereotype Owen had presented him with. “It’s the right thing to do.”

 

“You… honestly believe that.” It was more of a statement than a question, the Aware’s mind having a hard time wrapping the fact that Bastian’s had actually good intentions.

“Yes.” Replied the brunette with determination as he stared down to Owen’s eyes. “Yes I do.”

Owen frowned, breaking eye contact with Bastian as he began to walk slowly towards the other side of the room; Bastian pressed his back against the wall, sliding down to sit once again, a scowl on his face as well.

Owen’s back was facing Bastian, but the brunette didn’t care anymore, he wasn’t even looking at the killer.

“…You aren’t like them.” Owen softly said, Bastian barely managed to hear him.

“Do it.”

“You are different.”

“If you are going to kill me, kill me now.” Bastian frowned even more crossing his arms, staring at the dirty floor. “I am tired of playing these ridiculous games.”

Owen began to wonder what would have happened if he had met Bastian in different circumstances; how things would have gone if there was someone like Bastian near him when he was alive. He remembered bloodied noses, bruised cheeks… he remembers how much it hurt but it hurt him so much that someone like Bastian wasn’t there for him.

Maybe if he had met him long ago, before any of that stupid bullshit started, things would be incredibly different now.

Very different.

 

“I don’t care anymore, just get it over with.”

“I- I don’t…”

Slowly, Bastian eyes traveled to Owen’s back, the redhead teen shaking slightly, covering his mouth with his hand.

_Oh, fuck. Oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck-_

The Aware took a deep breath.

“Do you know who Maggot Boy is?” Owen asked without sarcasm or an insulting tone of voice. Bastian blinked, still frowning and tired about everything that was happening around him, but he was curious nonetheless.

“No.” he replied back, coldly.

Owen turned to face Bastian, the anger from his face vanished and instead was replaced by what Bastian thought was deep worry.

“Parker Jones is Maggot Boy.”

 

Bastian stared silently at Owen for several minutes, his face scrunching in anger as his frown burrowed.

“Shut up.”

“I said Parker Jones is-“

“Shut the fuck up!” Bastian replied in a yell. “Stop lying, I won’t fall on it.”

“I’m not lying.”

“Of course you are! Parker is _dead_ , he died months ago. I watched him _die_.” Bastian began to frantically pass his fingers through his thick hair, breathing faster and faster as he remembered the scene.

“Dead things can be alive as well, you know.”

Bastian stared up at Owen in horror, he already knew that the killer was a ‘zombie’ but the suggestion that Parker, that PJ was one of those… things made Bastian sick to his stomach.

“You are lying.”

“Why would I be lying? Why won’t you listen to me?”

“Because that’s what you do, Owen!” Bastian got up once again, walking towards Owen not with the intention of attacking him, but ready to face him on his lying.

“You are a serial killer that lies to people, you lie and then you kill them and repeat the process. You are a monster!”

“I AM NOT A MONSTER!” Owen shouted from the bottom of his lungs, baring his teeth while growling his eyes wide open.

“You are a monster,” Bastian softly replied, staring coldly at the teen. “You became a monster long time ago, Owen.”

 

_We could have been friends._

Owen hit Bastian’s cheek, sending the teenager straight to the ground smacking his face on the cold floor.

_If we had met back then, things could have been different now._

Bastian tried to get up, only for Owen to kick him in the stomach forcing him to lie down; desperately trying to crawl to the exit with no success; Owen stomped on his fingers causing Bastian to scream in pain.

_Maybe things would be better._

Bastian rolled in pain on the floor, hissing as he waved his hands trying to get rid of the pain, his belly and chest resting on the floor as he took deep breaths.

Owen crouched on front of him, his face close to Bastian’s, staring at the teenager’s brown eyes (so beautiful) coldly.

He remembered seeing him happy, smiling and laughing as he walked down the street.

 

Bastian stared back, no smile and no laughing, his eyes seeping intensity.

“Who are you?” the teenager asked in chokes, refusing to be afraid anymore.

“I am a monster.” Owen replied, leaning into Bastian face his lips touching his.

 

Bastian lips were soft and warm, reminding Owen of other lips he had kissed before when he was alive, but different from before, Bastian radiated _life_ , the complete opposite from Owen himself.

Owen was cold and dead, and he was full of terrible hate for everything in the world, even himself.

 

Bastian pushed Owen away from him as hard as he could, his heart pumping with adrenaline and sheer _horror_ of what had happened, his cheeks red with a mixture of surprise, embarrassment and bright red anger; he wasn’t sure how he managed to but Bastian ran away from the room, running across the halls as he desperately tried to find a way to get out of the building.

Behind him, a figure tried to catch up with him; looking back for a fraction of second let Bastian know that Owen was right behind him, a hatchet on his hands.

 

“Bastian!” a different voice called out, one which sounded familiar to him forcing him to stop on his tracks and turn back.

 _Is that-_ Before he had a chance to even think about what had happened, through the hallway another small hooded figure appeared, tackling Owen as hard as it could into the ground making the hatchet fly away. Bastian recognized the figure very easily, its picture being around the internet for weeks now.

“Maggot Boy?!” Bastian muttered to himself, observing how the two small figures began to fight each other rolling around the floor.

The teenager was curious as to see who won, but he already knew that he needed to get out of there as soon as possible; he began to run on the hallway once again.

 

Owen took notice of this, managing to barely grab the hatchet that was inches away from him and throwing it to the ceiling.

“What-“ Maggot Boy muttered, his eyes going wide as he realized how everything started to rumble above them.

“No!” He screamed, the young brunette running through the corridor towards Bastian and leaving Owen unattended. Bastian looked up for a fraction of second to see just how the ceiling above him began to crumble.

“Bastian!” he heard the same voice call again, tackling him away from the rubble that fell from the ceiling; the rubble crashed against the floor cracking it, the hole expanding it until it reached Maggot Boy and Bastian.

“Oh no no no no no-“ Bastian muttered as the floor began to give away, finally opening a hole beneath them, the darkness swallowing them whole.

 

Regaining consciousness was harder this time, the air being musty and dusty, rubble and wood poking him awkwardly in the back and leaving slight scratches on his skin.

Waking up in a jolt, Bastian sat up straight patting his own torso to make sure there weren’t any holes on him, and sure enough the teenager was very whole. He could feel his fingers, he could feel his entire body; his entire body hurt and he was completely bruised, but as long as he was whole he didn’t care at all.

Bastian took a deep breath, coughing immediately due to the dust in the air; he tried to call out to the one that helped him.

“Maggot Boy?” he called, getting no answer; his eyes began adjusting to the darkness around him, but the dust in the air made it hard for him to recognize shapes in the rubble. “Maggot Boy, are you there?”

“Ggk…”

Bastian felt his stomach go cold when he heard the soft grunting. His fears were confirmed when the dust finally settled and he found Maggot Boy; the hooded figure had a large piece of wood piercing his body, the wood entering at his back and exiting through his chest.

“Oh God, oh my God!” Bastian began to panic covering his mouth with his hands. As an instinct, he reached with his shaky hands, trying to see if there was some way to pull the wood out.

 

Before he touched Maggot Boy’s body, the boy woke up grunting, simply sliding off the wood as if nothing had happened at all, leaving a large horrifying gash on his chest with skin slightly hanging off from the wound.

Bastian was completely horrified.

 

“I uh, I’m okay, just shaky. I’m dandy.” Maggot Boy replied, rubbing his forehead with his fingers; even if he wasn’t capable of feeling conventional pain it still was hell of an awful feeling to be pierced by wood.

“I- Are you okay? Are you hurt?” It was then that Maggot Boy realized that Bastian was staring at him. A lot.

Maggot Boy bit his lip, his right hand traveling to his lips as he realized that he had his mask off, as well as his hoodie.

 

“Parker?”


	7. Supermassive Black Hole

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He can’t feel pain, not anymore

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bastian learns the truth, Lazaro becomes Desperate, Marianne recieves Approval, Owen questions himself, Chainey catches up and Samantha is left with the mess.

For some moments, Bastian thought that he was actually dead. How other way he would be in front of his best friend’s dead brother?

He felt very alive, however, but there was still the issue that Parker was standing in front of him. _Alive_.

“P-p-“ He stuttered, the words wouldn’t come out of his mouth. “Parker? I-Is that you?”

 

The man in front of him just stared with wide eyes, not sure how to react.

“No, no. You aren’t Parker, you can’t be Parker, Parker is-“

“Dead.”

They stared at each other in silence for a long time not daring to move an inch.

 

The rumbling above their heads snapped them out of their trance, rubble beginning to fall as the building began to collapse.

“Run!” Parker yelled, making his way towards Bastian grabbing his hand, dragging him across the room to find an exit. Bastian let himself be dragged around as the rubble began to fall over them, barely missing them by inches as they made their way through the building huffing and panting.

“Come on come on come on come on-“ Parker kept muttering to himself as he dashed towards the exit, finally reaching the old door on the building. He practically kicked it open, destroying the wooden door into several pieces as he pulled Bastian along with him, throwing themselves to the street as the building finally collapsed, a dust of cloud surrounded the area.

“Are you- cough! Are you okay?” Parker coughed, getting the lungs out of his system, finding ironic how much it bothered him even though he didn’t need to breathe anymore.

Bastian laid with his cheek pressed against the cold concrete, sweat dripping off his face as a loud buzz drowned his thoughts. He coughed the dust out of his lounges, standing up as he stared down at the now demolished building.

“Bastian…” Parker called softly, guilt on his voice.

 

The teenager turned around to face Parker, staring him down in confusion.

“Parker…” Bastian’s heart sank when he saw Parker’s condition. Stitches on his eyebrow, his tired green eyes (they always had a spark. Now the spark was gone), and his greying skin.

Parker used to be so full of life and now _this_.

“What happened?”

“I…” Parker didn’t look at Bastian in the eyes, turning his gaze to the ground instead.

“It’s a long story.”

“You are Maggot Boy?”

Parker bit his lip, nodding slowly.

“Oh, god.” Bastian covered his mouth in shock as he took everything in.

“Bastian, I-“

 

Bastian saw how the hatchet, spinning through the air lodged itself in one of Parker’s shoulders, splattering his own face with some of his dead friend’s blood.

Parker hunched over grunting as he felt the force of the hatchet hitting him; the teenager immediately turned to see Owen’s figure over a building for a fraction of second before the redhead ran away once again.

“Owen!” Parker yelled as he was ready to chase him once again but stopping when he felt Bastian pull his uninjured arm close to him.

“Parker, oh- oh god!” Bastian panicked as his shaky hands got close to the hatchet not sure if he should remove it or not.

“Bastian- It’s- it’s okay, it doesn’t hurt. I can’t hurt anymore.”

The smaller teenager grabbed the handle of the hatchet, breathing deeply as he pulled it out of his shoulder with a spongy sound coming out. Blood softly poured from his wound and into his sleeve but at that point Parker was slightly used to it, instead twirling the hatchet in his hand.

Bastian was trying his hardest to hold back tears, his stomach clenching at experiencing how nonchalant Parker was about all of it.

“Parker, I have to tell Davey about-“

“Don’t!” he unconsciously grabbed Bastian hands, his green eyes staring back at him.

“Please… don’t. Don’t tell him. I… I’m not ready.”

“PJ, he is your brother, he needs to-“

“I know, I know. Not now. Please.” Now it was Parker the one holding back tears. “I beg of you.”

The taller teen bit his lip. “…Okay.”

Parker smiled softly. “Thank you…”

“But,” Bastian looked down to Parker, his eyes sad and exhausted.

“Are you… are you okay?”

 

Parker knew Bastian wasn’t talking about his most recent injuries, but in general. Was _he_ okay? He didn’t know, the only thing he knew was that he was extremely exhausted, wanted to go home and curl to his bed and never wake up.

“Yes,” he lied for the time-being. “I’m fine.”

The smaller teenager held back tears. “Are you sure? I-“

Parker embraced Bastian in a tight hug, tears flowing from his eyes softly and smearing the teenager with his blood; Bastian hugged back but not as tightly, Parker’s dusty and dirty hair tickling him on the chin.

“I missed you…” Parker whispered, burying his head on Bastian’s chest.

“It’s okay,” Bastian replied, biting his lips as a tear came out of his eye. “We miss you too.”

 

\---

 

Parker dragged his feet across the floor leaving blood-stained footprints on the concrete of the warehouse as he silently made his way to the bathroom.

It was way past midnight, Parker made sure Chainey and Samantha were asleep in their respective rooms before he entered the bathroom, dragging a the first aid kit and a chair with him.

He took his hoodie and shirt off on front of the mirror as he began to stitch his wounds back together, not feeling a thing when the needle pierced his skin every time. Having to stitch himself had become a habit he didn’t even think of it anymore; finishing with his shoulder the teenager began to stitch the hole in his chest directly on top of his vivisection scar. Sighing, Parker began the messy work, dried blood on the edges of the wound and in the tip of his fingers.

He finished stitching the hole up, but he would have to ask Samantha for help with the hole on his back, but that could wait.

 

The teen crawled to his bed feeling strangely calm, having met with Bastian was… Parker couldn’t put it into words. He was happy that his friend was safe, that he had managed to save him and having touched him once again. Parker never thought he would have had a chance to see him ever again, and yet not only did he save him from Owen, but now Bastian knew about his secret.

He should be alarmed, but Parker felt like a huge weight was lifted from his chest; now Bastian knew and he wouldn’t have to hide himself from the teen anymore.

Davey was something Parker needed to think about, because if Bastian knew it would be unfair to not let his brother into his secret, but he could figure that out later. For now, he needed to protect Bastian and deal with Owen.

 

“PJ, are you okay?” He felt the gentle nudge of Samantha on uninjured shoulder, waking him up softly as he shifted under the covers.

“What? Why?” he asked groggily still slightly asleep.

“There is blood all over your bed.”

Parker blinked, sitting up and realizing that his mattress was in fact covered with blood, specifically from the hole on his back.

“Oh, huh.”

“You also have blood on your back.” Samantha pointed nonchalantly, strangely used at how banged up her friends would suddenly show up.

“Yeah, that’s-“ Samantha squinted her eyes, finding humor on how nonchalant they were at the scenario. “That’s probably where the blood is coming from, right?”

“Yeah… Sam, can you help me?” Parker scratched the back of his neck slightly embarrassed.

“What did you do last night anyways, Peej?” Samantha retrieved the sewing tools.

“Oh, it’s a long story?”

“We got time.”

“I uh, to make a long story short Owen kidnapped Bastian again and I went there to save him.”

Samantha dropped the needle and thread flinching, immediately picking it up from the floor again.

“…And?”

“And Bastian saw me and, well. He knows now, that I’m alive.”

“Oh.”

 

The redhead was sewing the wound on Parker’s back, biting her lip whenever the needle piercing his skin. “Well, what now?”

“I don’t know!” Parker buried his face on his hands, grunting in displeasure. “I don’t know. I should have this figured out, know what to do next but to be honest the only thing I want to do is just go to sleep and forget about everything ever.” He grunted once again.

“What should I do, Sam? It seems that whatever I do ends in people getting killed.” The teenager sighed, tired. “I wanted to ignore it but in the end it just led to more people being murdered! What am I supposed to do?”

“Parker, it’s just a very terrible situation, it isn’t your fault at all. There, done!”

The teenager passed his fingers across the new stitches on his back, hard to reach but he managed to touch it with his fingertips.

“Thanks Sam, I couldn’t reach there last night.”

“It’s okay Peej, I just wished you would tell us what you were planning on doing before rushing and doing things on your own. We can help you.”

“To be honest, most of the time I do this without thinking.”

“That’s fair,” Samantha chuckled, putting the thread and needle away.

 

\---

 

Many things were splattered across Marianne’s table, but even her mess seemed to be organized in some way. A coffee mug and a platter of cookies lay on the far end of the table, sipping it occasionally as the redhead wrote things down.

 She didn’t flinch when the door was opened in a slam, a tall and very pale man basically stomping towards her; Marianne sighed without even turning to face the man.

“ _Marianne_ ” he hissed, standing behind her while the redhead continued to write things down ignoring him.

“Why hello Lazaro, what a surprise, I thought you were chained to your bed until you stopped leaking blood out of your ears.”

He continued to stand behind her huffing until Marianne decided she had enough and turned to face him.

“What?” she asked, her eyes looking up to the man.

“I brought you here for two reasons, and you still haven’t done anything at all.”

“Excuse me? I have done a lot, actually. I know more about this little child that keeps you awake at night.” Marianne said almost insulted at Lazaro’s suggestion.

“Actually, now I think I can-“

“I don’t care!” Lazaro yelled out, blood starting to softly pour from his nose.

“I told you to bring me the killer, and you haven’t- you only ran into him once and that’s it, you haven’t even gone and tried to hunt him once again. What the hell am I paying you for?! Sit around and drink coffee like nothing is happening?”

“Well, to be fair, your little protégée left me slightly incapacitated.” Marianne gestured to her still bandaged and stitched palm; the one Parker had pierced with a knife not too long ago.

“I can’t do much in this condition, you know.”

Lazaro just kept staring at her, it seemed like the man was about to explode in rage.

“But never mind that, I know I was also hired for something else and in fact, I got some of it right here.”

Marianne gave the man a small vial of crimson liquid, Lazaro almost snatching it off immediately from her grasp inspecting the vial for some seconds.

“I requested _more_ than this.”

“That’s the last of it, Laz.”

“Then make more!”

“Then make more, he says. Lazaro, you do know where this tranquilizer comes from, don’t you? You do know I can’t make more if I don’t perform my surgeries. It’s a miracle I managed to get so much by that one session with Mister Jones.”

“The plan was for you to capture Owen, and then make more of it from him.” Lazaro snapped back at Marianne.

“True, but it is not that easy, you see. I won’t be able to get more until we catch that little runt, so you’ll have to wait.” Marianne turned to her table once again, taking a sip of her coffee.

“Unless, you have a better plan?”

 

Lazaro passed his thumb across the glass of the vial, his chest rising up and down as he thought about it. He was absolutely desperate, he needed to take more measures.

“You know Lazaro, I heard Parker found another young man like him… Anthony Chainey, am I right?”

Lazaro bit his lip, tightening his knuckle.

“I haven’t gotten to meeting him properly, you know.”

“Just-“ Lazaro rubbed his forehead strongly feeling the cold sweat from it, the blood pouring now even more from his nose. “Just get me the damn liquid.”

“Lazaro, if I didn’t know you I would think you are giving me your approval.” Marianne taunted the man even further.

“Yes,” he sighed with his gaze still on the glass vial on his hand. “You have my approval.”

Marianne smiled from ear to ear. “Alright! But first, I have to take care of many things. And it seems you have to, as well.”

Marianne looked at him, negating softly with her head as she chuckled softly.

“What is so funny?”

“Oh, Lazaro. Look at what you have become.”

 

\---

 

After somehow successfully managing to sneak inside of his house (he didn’t want his parents to attack him with questions), Bastian made his way to the bathroom to wash the blood off his face.

He turned on the light, inspecting himself in the mirror as he saw his new bruises and wounds. The teenager’s smooth face was slightly scratched, his cheek bruised and his nose scraped, but the injury that caught his attention was his bruised lip.

Bastian slightly touched his lip with his fingers, flinching when he felt the slight pain in his lip. He tried his hardest to push away the memory of Owen kissing him ( _Oh God_ ), replacing it with the memory of Parker.

He washed his face off, washing away Parker’s blood as he made his way to his bed.

It had been an exhausting day and he was too tired physically and emotionally to make a sense of what had happened, but he knew something.

Parker was okay.

 

\---

 

Relocating wasn’t that hard for Owen, he could basically fit in any place. Moving to a new place was even easier by the fact that Sovereign City was full of abandoned buildings, there were even entire blocks that had been abandoned ever since the zombie apocalypse. Owen could have just faked his death when his previous apartment building was destroyed but he couldn’t afford to think Parker would believe he was dead; then he would stop looking for him.

He began to grow tired of being chased around every day, if only because it brought him nowhere, if anything he accidentally grew a crush on Bastian, the guy he believed he hated.

 _Fuck,_ how did it even come to that?

It seemed like Owen life was full of terrible decisions as of late.

 

“Ugh,” he buried his head on his palms while he rubbed his eyes. His cats gathered around him purring softly; at least it didn’t take long for them to find their owner.

“Hey guys.” Owen patted the head of one of the cats, the little animal purring softly. “Sorry, I’m not really in the mood to go for food right now, you are gonna have to wait.”

The cats continued to purr and meow at him, lying next to him as they fell asleep.

“I know, I know.” He felt guilty, but the cats would have to deal with it, he wasn’t in any state to go and hunt for food.

The question remained in his head: what now? He had definitely attracted attention to himself from Parker, but at the moment Owen didn’t even know if he wanted his attention anymore. He questioned his own reasons to want attention, but it just made the teen’s head throb.

“Uuuuuuuuuuuuuugh” He grunted as he curled next to his cats.

 

\---

 

“Chainey? Are you up?” Parker peeked through the door of Chainey’s room; the poor kid was lying with his face down on the bed with the blankets being a terrible mess over him, it seemed he didn’t have a good night of sleep.

“Yes, yeah I’m awake, I’m totally awake right now.” Muttered the teenager as he sat up, stretching his back as he faced Parker.

“What’s the- whoa!”

Parker had forgotten that he was in fact shirtless after Samantha had stitched him up, his fresh wounds (and his previous vivisection scar) being visible to Chainey.

“What happened? Those look recent!” Chainey got up from the bed as he began to change into more appropriate clothes (his gigantic pajamas made him look pretty ridiculous, Parker thought).

“Remember how I said I was going to keep an eye on my friends?”

“Yeah, I’m assuming that didn’t go too well.”

“Yep, ran into Owen last night.”

“Man, nobody tells me anything around here.” Chainey finished dressing up as Parker picked up a gigantic (actually normal sized) hoodie from the ground, putting it on to hide his stitches.

“I just came home like two hours ago, Chainey. Give it a rest.”

Chainey simply shrugged.

“Anyways, I’m actually here to ask you a favor and catch you up on what has been happening.” Parker said as he adjusted the hoodie so it wouldn’t look too ridiculous on him.

“Owen has been attacking my friends, especially Bastian. I am going to need you to keep an eye on them.”

“Whoa, wait. Isn’t that keeping an eye on three people? How am I supposed to do that?”

“Don’t worry, I’m going to talk to him and we-“

“Wait wait wait wait wait,” Chainey interrupted waving his palms in front of Parker catching his attention. “ _What?_ ”

Parker blinked at him but before he could answer Chainey continued. “You were the one that said you couldn’t be seen by anybody, and suddenly you-“

“Bastian saw me, Chainey. He knows, he found out.”

Chainey stared at the smaller teenager in awkward silence, scratching his neck nervously before he replied back.

“Sorry,” he said with a soft voice.

“It’s okay. You were right, I… I don’t tell you stuff. So I’m catching you up now, but before I do can I trust you to keep an eye on them?”

“Uh, sure PJ, no problem!” Chainey said rather curious.

“But, what are you going to do then if they will all be gathered somewhere?”

Parker nodded with his head, taking a deep breath.

“I have a plan.”

 

\---

 

Luckily for Bastian it was Saturday, meaning that he would be alone in his home for most of the morning, his father mother and siblings having things to do on their own leaving him to sleep for as long as he wanted.

The previous night had been exhausting, his stomach and his lip ( _Why did he do that?_ ) hurting, but he didn’t care. He shifted under the sheets hugging one of his pillows close, sighing as he began to drift into sleep once again.

_Tap!_

_Tap!_

Bastian grunted as he was brought to the living world once again, strange tapping sounds coming from his bedroom window. Sighing and still half asleep the teen dragged his feet across the carpet as he made his way to the window, just in time for another pebble to hit the glass and bounce off.

He opened the window, the pebble that was going to hit the glass softly hitting him in the face instead.

“Ow,” he said not actually hurting, but slightly surprised at the hit.

“Sorry!” A very familiar voice came from under him.

 

Focusing his eyes, Bastian was surprised to see Parker in an oversized hoodie standing below him.

“Par- what are you doing?” Bastian wasn’t sure how to react, happy to see him again, angry because Parker could be seen by anyone or surprised because after all it wasn’t a fever dream what happened last night.

“Can I come up?”

“I uh,” Even though the entire street and his house were pretty empty Bastian still turned to see if anyone was around. “Sure, I’ll go downstairs and open the door-“

Without any prompt, Parker jumped to the wall quickly climbing it until he reached Bastian’s window, needing no help to enter to the teenager’s room.

Bastian was slightly surprised, back when Parker was alive he had the reflexes of a fat turtle.

“Sorry, I’m kind of in a hurry.” Parker said, looking around in Bastian’s room.

 _I’m in Bastian Nightingale’s room,_ If he had been alive, Parker would be red like a tomato. _Oh, Micah would be so jealous of me right now._ He shook his head, he needed to focus.

“How are you feeling? Are you okay, did Owen do anything to you last night?” Parker asked worriedly towards Bastian slightly embarrassed of how childish he was being.

“Peej, You are the one that was pierced with a piece of wood and then had an axe lodged on your shoulder. Are YOU okay?” Bastian asked slightly worried at the current state of his friend.

“What? Yeah, I told you I’m fine. No need to worry about me.”

“Are you… sure?”

“Yeah… listen, Baz. I-“

Parker bit his lip. “I’m sorry. I screwed up, alright? If I could, I would have told you all way sooner but… too many things happened. I’m still dealing with things, so I’m sorry.”

“…It’s okay PJ. You don’t have to worry about it, I understand. It’s an incredibly difficult situation.”

Parker awkwardly moved in place, he should have expected the conversation to go like that. After all he was dead to Bastian, they needed to talk about the things that had happened.

“Listen Bastian, I need you to do something for me. You, Micah and Davey had been attacked by Owen because of me; he knows who I am and who I keep close.”

“Actually,” Bastian interrupted. “I am pretty sure he attacked Micah on Davey on accident.”

“On accident? How do you attack someone ‘on accident’?”

“He didn’t know it was them, basically. That’s what I gathered from what he told me, anyways.”

Parker felt a bit of guilt, but that DID make him feel better, the attack being more of an accident on Owen’s part rather than a deliberate attempt to get to Parker.

“Even if that’s true, I’m still worried he will attack any of you three, he probably is pretty pissed off right now. I’m going to need you to be with Micah and Davey- go to a movie, play videogames at one of your homes- I don’t know, but I need you three to stick together. A friend of mine is going to keep an eye on you from afar, so you won’t have to worry about being unsafe.”

Bastian was slightly taken aback.

“One of your friends?”

“He is, uh, like me. Kind of like a zombie, basically.” God, his life was a literal joke. “He’s cool, I like him.”

“Okay…” Bastian had so many questions about everything in general- he wanted to know how Parker really was. Having died in such a violent manner and coming back to life can’t be healthy for someone’s self-esteem.

“Please, Bastian. It is very important, if anything was to happen to any of you again, I…”

“Parker, it’s okay. I’ll do it.” He put his hand on his shoulder reassuringly, Parker looking up to Bastian.

“But, what are you planning on doing?”

“…I can’t tell you.”

“Peej, please.”

“Just- just trust me, okay?”

Bastian sighed deeply.

“Okay, I trust you.”

“Thank you. I have to go- I have many things to do before tonight.” Parker walked towards the window, crouching as he was ready to take his leave.

“Peej, wait!” Bastian called out; Parker felt his un-beating heart on his throat as he turned around to face his friend again.

“I’ll see you tomorrow, right?”

Parker’s chest scar burned intensely.

“Yes, see you tomorrow.”

“See ya, Peej.”

“See ya.” Saying this, Parker let himself drop from the window of the teen’s room, landing softly on the grass and running away.

Bastian breathed deeply, grabbing his phone ready to message Davey.

 

[11:11:45]B. Nightingale: Davey? are you busy today?

[11:12:15]Davey Jones Sock Locker: no why

[11:12:50]B. Nightingale: Im bored, let’s go to the movies no?

[11:13:40]Davey Jones Sock Locker: yesssssss

[11:13:50]Davey Jones Sock Locker: lets watch mazerunner orsomeshit I. heard from mcgee thatone is good

[11:14:10]B. Nightingale: hey invite Micah too no? kid needs a break from all the bullshit that has happened.

[11:15:30]Davey Jones Sock Locker: txtig him now

[11:17:10]Davey Jones Sock Locker: he says hes in as long as we pay for nachos.and soda

[11:18:00]B. Nightingale: ok, see you at 4 at the plaza ok!

 

Bastian sighed, as he looked out of the window. He hoped Parker knew what he was doing, whatever it was that he was going to do.

 

\---

 

The set of buildings had been abandoned since years ago, ever since the zombie apocalypse happened. Some districts became abandoned, and never repopulated even if they came with a “permanent” solution to the zombie attacks. Now, they were empty apart from the cats living there.

Parker dragged the hatchet behind him, his sneakers stepping over the water puddles as he continued his search. Chainey had texted him earlier, saying how he Micah, Bastian and Davey were safe and sound, leaving Parker to conduct his plan.

He came across several cats in an alley, some of them very familiar to him. He swung the hatchet, resting it against his shoulder as he breathed deeply.

It was time.

 

“Owen!”  The teen yelled at the top of his lungs, waiting for an answer. His cats were staring at him curiously, Parker knew he was there.

“Owen, I followed your cat trail to here- I KNOW you are here! Come out now!”

He waited, the cats gathering around him as he did so.

“I am not leaving Owen! You wanted my attention? Here I am!”

He waited more.

 

“Wow, Parker.” A voice came from above, a dark small figure making his way to the alley from the emergency stairs of one of the buildings. He seemed… calm. “I didn’t actually think you would search for me.”

Owen stood in front of Parker, his hands on the pockets of his hoodie looking straight ahead. Normally, Owen looked happy and generally very unsettling, but this time around he looked very calm, tired even.

“…And?” Parker exclaimed, slightly exasperated.

“And what?”

“You harassed my friends and killed people to get my attention, for me to come to you- I am here Owen, and I am all ears. What do you want?”

Owen shrugged.

“I don’t know,” the redhead answered apathetically. “I didn’t think it trough, I suppose.”

Parker’s lip twitched. “Come on, Owen. What do you want? You couldn’t have spent so much effort for me to come to you, only to say you don’t want anything from me.”

Owen bared his teeth, growly softly.

“You sacrificed lives for me- and you don’t even know what you want to do with me now? I’m here Owen, I literally came all over here for you. Don’t you want to tell me anything?”

The redhead scowled and began to shake noticeably.

“So? What is it, you didn’t do it for any particular reason? Were you just that bored? Or is it-“

 

“Shut the fuck up, Parker!”

Owen was snarling, his fist shaking as he stared wide eyed at the brunette in front of him.

“You think this is easy for me? I didn’t actually think you would come! I- I’m not ready!”

“Ready for what, Owen? What do you have planned? What is this ridiculous fucking game taking you?”

“It’s not a game! I- I just-“ Owen passed his fingers through his hair, trying to figure out what to say. “God, this is harder than I thought.”

Parker brow furrowed in confusion. _What the hell is he talking about?_

“Look, what I said before? About thinking we aren’t that different from each other? I still believe it, Peej. I still believe we aren’t that different from each other.”

Parker bit his lip, as Owen began to walk closer to him slowly.

“I saw how they threated your friend, and that is how they threated you, right? I know how that feels. I have been there, too.”

“What-“

“Listen, I- I don’t know, okay?! I just thought- maybe if I kept pressing, you would agree to come with me. To take sovereign city for ourselves, to become _someone_ ”

“What makes you think I would agree to that? I didn’t agree back then when you attacked one of my friends, what makes you think that I would agree to join you in whatever the fuck you are planning, just because you killed people?”

“Jeez, I don’t know Parker! It made sense at the time, okay? I just-“ Owen bit his lip. “I just see you now in a different light.”

“What, the ‘don’t fuck with my friends’ light? Because that is how I am feeling right now, Owen.”

“I was like you, Parker! I was literally like you- I was nobody back when I was alive, people treated me like garbage, why do you pretend we are so different? Everybody hurt us, and you still think you owe them ‘Maggot Boy’, some sort of symbol for heroics… As if you have any obligation to ‘protect them’… give me a break.”

“I just,” Parker gripped his hatchet tightly, remembering Alan and his friends who made his very short life miserable. “I do what its right. It’s not about whom hurt me or not- this is what is right. It’s about what I can do, to help.”

“You don’t have an obligation to do it!” Owen yelled frustrated, the cats around him beginning to back off and leaving the alley, afraid of their owner’s temper.

“I know. I don’t care, its right.”

“I-“ Owen began to pace around frustrated, his fist tight and shaking as he began to breathe desperately. “I just want to kill them all, I just want to make them pay and it- you, you have been through similar things, and why don’t you? Why do you get to be the good guy? Why do you get to be the one that is revered as some sort of ‘Hero’?”

“People being assholes to you do not give you the right to kill innocents!”

 

Owen became more agitated, Parker rapidly walked towards him with the hatchet in hand (but without intentions of using it), getting directly on front of Owen; the redhead teen turned to him with wide eyes, seeming in the verge of a panic attack.

Parker had never even thought of how Owen’s life could have been. He was right, they were incredibly similar in some aspects; for now they seemed to have died at the same age, and they both had terrible problems of harassment. Parker could practically feel the fear and sadness on Owen’s eyes, it reminded him too much of himself and Micah, all the bruises and scratches they had to endure.

“Owen, I know it hurts, I understand.”

“You,” Owen said in ragged breaths. “You are too damn _nice_. We can take this city, together. Nothing would stop us.”

“I would stop us.”

 

Owen seemed to become more agitated, Parker was not sure how to react. He remembered what Bastian did previously that day, when he became agitated himself; Parker placed his hand on Owen’s shoulder without thinking it through, Owen’s eyes shooting wide open the moment Parker touched him.

_Oh, shit-_

 

Owen placed his hand on the back of Parker’s head, pulling him closer to his face. Their lips touched, Owen pressing his lips against the brunette’s; they were softer than his, Owen’s lip ragged and hard.

Parker felt Owen’s hand on his hair, but rather than pull away, Parker leaned more into him with his hand traveling to Owen’s back, pulling him closer to his body as they continued to kiss.

 _We can’t be so different_.

Parker didn’t imagine it being like this. He expected his first kiss to be from Bastian, or at least Micah (He would be lying if he said he hadn’t thought about it at least once), but for a moment he forgot that Owen was the one he was kissing; his mind replaced the redhead with the tall, blonde-brunette boy he had always longed for so much- he imagined his life normal. He pretended that he was still alive, in the street, kissing Bastian; unaware he pressed Owen tightly against him, the idea of Bastian still in his mind.

 

He opened his eyes slightly, but he didn’t see Bastian- It was Owen the one against his lips.

 

Parker felt the floor moving under him, falling into a chasm of realization.

Owen kidnapped Bastian.

Owen attacked Micah and Davey.

Owen was a _murderer._

 

Parker pulled himself away, but Owen just pressed his head harder against his; Parker proceeded to push Owen away from himself, breathing harsh as he came to his senses.

“Owen, no, I-“

“Peej-“

“Owen, No! You- you kill people. You almost killed my friends, you have murdered people so I can ‘come to you’- that’s- that’s terrifying! You-“ Parker walked backwards, now beginning to panic.

“Parker, we can do so much-“

“No! Don’t you get it? You use your pain to hurt; you kill innocent people just because you feel like it! I am not like you at all! Stop pretending you understand me!”

“Is that how it is? Fine, then. So be it.”

 

Owen lunged at Parker, knocking him to the floor as he pulled a knife from one of his pockets; he pressed the knife against Parker lips, making some vertical cuts on them, splitting his lips.

“You think you are so good? Let’s see how your jock boyfriend likes you after this, Parker.”

Desperately, Parker managed to grab the hatchet he had let go from earlier, swinging it and hitting Owen straight in his side. The teenager grunted, blood coming from his mouth as he grabbed the hatchet from his side, using the flat part to hit Parker in the head.

“Fuck you! We could rule this place!” He continued to hit Parker in the face, the brunette squirming under his grasp. “We could have made them pay! We could have made them fear us! We- we could have- we could…”

Owen threw the hatchet, Parker’s face slightly bleeding as the unconscious boy sprawled on the concrete; Owen could finish it right now, he could simply grab the hatchet and cut Parker’s head off- that is what he deserved anyways, for refusing to ally with him.

“Agh!” Owen screamed to the sky, scratching his own face as he tried to figure out what to do, he had to kill him, he had to make sure Parker Jones, Maggot Boy was dead and stayed dead this time, he NEEDED to kill him. He HAD to kill him.

 

Owen began to cry, pulling close to the unconscious boy and kissing his lips one more time, putting his forehead against the brunette’s.

 

\---

 

Samantha twiddled with the pencil on her hands, the notebook written with several words about how her life has been ever since she met Parker. She bit the eraser part of the pencil as the kept thinking; Parker had great progress emotionally, however the entire Owen situation seemed to take a huge toll on him. He had promised her that he would set up a “trap” for Owen of sorts, and even if she had offered herself to help, Parker refused since he believed it was too dangerous. Well, she was still human, and humans are indeed far more fragile than the undead, she had to admit.

Chainey was out as well, keeping an eye on Parker’s friend just like he asked to, so she was indeed alone in the house. She wasn’t scared, the woman wasn’t even sure if Owen knew about her existence at all; it slightly bothered her, Samantha wished there was something she could help with.

A loud thud was heard outside, making her jump in surprise in her seat; after calming down Samantha slowly got up from her seat. “Parker? Chainey? Is that you?” she said as she approached the door to the outside. “You scared me, guys…”

But there was only silence, silence that bothered Samantha a lot.

“Guys…? This isn’t funny anymore.”

She opened the metal curtain, gasping at the sight in front of her.

 

Parker was sprawled on the entrance of the building unconscious, blood pouring from the wounds in his lips. Samantha quickly kneeled next to him, grabbing him by the shoulders and shaking him violently as she felt her heart beat in desperation.

“Parker? Parker! Parker, please, answer me! Parker!” she began to cry out.

 

Parker found himself, lying on the side of the road with a pool of blood under him, a circle of people staring down at him, including his brother and Bastian, the truck that had hit him near to the scene. He could feel the blood pouring out of him freely, his life along with it.

He felt Samantha arms around him as she carried him inside, his head lolling with him.

“I don’t want to die,” he muttered, his throat dry and his body numb (he can’t feel pain, not anymore) as he let himself be taken once again by the black.


	8. Everybody Knows you Cried last Night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “No I just- I’m just happy you are okay, PJ. I’m really sorry.”  
> “For what?” asked Parker slightly confused.  
> “For having to go through this alone.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Parker reaches to his friends, Marianne has plans, Samantha gets worried, Lazaro is planning something, Bastian breaks down.

Parker felt himself heavy, his body sinking into the mattress as the light blanket covered him; he was uncomfortable at how casual this experience was to him.

He was strangely alive. Parker would have expected Owen to simply murder him, especially after the incident that happened last night.

Then it hit him- what he did last night. He kissed _Owen_. He _kissed Owen._

Parker felt vile on his stomach, how could he have done that? Owen was a terrible individual that has harassed his friends and his brother, how could he forget that? Parker felt his chest heavy, he couldn’t believe what he had done.

 

He opened his eyes, sitting on his bed as he began to pass his palms all over his body, trying to find any new stitches or holes he should know about.

 _Huh,_ Parker was slightly relieved that it seemed he didn’t have any important stitch in his body.

The teen found himself in his room in the warehouse. Getting out of his bed, the teenager made his way to the door but it was opened before he reached it.

“PJ! You are okay, thank goodness!” Samantha practically yelled from the door, running towards the teen and embracing him in a tight hug.

“I was so worried, I thought you were dead for real when I found you on door-“

“Wait, what?”

Parker got slightly away from Samantha, looking at her in the face with confusion.

“You came here last night and passed out at the door, didn’t you?”

“No I- that totally didn’t happen at all?” Parker’s brow furrowed trying to remember what happened last night.

He got in a fight with Owen, and then the redhead managed to knock him out.

“Owen knocked me out and… that’s it. We were in the abandoned building district, far from here actually.”

“Do you think-“

“What, Owen brought me here?” Parker thought of it, it seemed like the only logical explanation of how he reached the warehouse. It seemed ridiculous, but it was the only way.

“I don’t know, maybe? What else then?”

Parker hugged Samantha tightly, burying his face on her shoulder.

 

“Did Owen do that to your face, then?”

“…My face?”

 

Parker let go of her slightly frightened, noticing how Samantha went pale all of sudden; he passed his fingers on his face feeling the scars.

Hurriedly, Parker grabbed a hand mirror lying around, inspecting his face intently.

His lips were cut vertically, thin stitches pulling his skin back together. It wasn’t as bad as Parker thought it would be, but it still upset him to find even more scars added to his body.

“Yeah, I guess.” He calmly replied, putting the mirror down turning to Samantha and rubbing his face with his palms.

“Peej, I know right now you are having a hard time, but I’m worried about you.”

“Sam, I’m fine-“

“You are not fine, Parker! Last night I found you and I had no idea if you were dead or not! Stop trying to believe you can handle all of this by yourself- you just can’t! Don’t you understand? You are slowly killing yourself!”

The teen buried his face on his palms sighing as he took Samantha’s scolding in; as much as Parker didn’t want to admit it but he knew Samantha was right.

“I know- I’m sorry. It’s just that I’m scared that Owen will hurt anyone else. But I guess that already happened…”

“PJ, we are your friends. You know you can count with us, but we can’t help you if you don’t let us.”

 

“I-“

“Hello and good morning!” Chainey pretty much slammed close the metallic gate of the front of the warehouse, strutting around as he made his way towards the living-room, throwing himself on the couch lying with his face down.

“Do you know what movie sucks a lot? Dracula, the new one or whatever.”

“Chainey, did you just come home?” Parker ventured out of his room along with Samantha, making their way to the tall teenager.

“Yeah, after their movie was over they all decided to go and watch another. Oh, and after that one was over, they decided to watch even another movie.” Chainey’s voice sounded so frustrated, Parker couldn’t help but smile a little.

“Then after that was done I followed them all home, and just to make sure I did laps around their homes to see if they were okay! Do you know how fucking hard is it to keep up considering my little ‘condition’? I-“

“Thank you, Chainey.” Parker said with a soft voice, sincerely appreciating his friend’s efforts. “Thanks a lot, it really means a lot to me.”

“…Its okay, Peej. I’m just very tired.” Chainey grunted as he turned on the couch, still lying down on it but now looking up at Samantha and Parker; he slightly flinched when he saw’s Parker’s face and feeling embarrassed at doing so.

“What happened on your end? How did your plan go?”

“It-“ Parker bit his lip, feeling the thin stitches on them and slightly tugging at them with his teeth. “It… went. Not as I expected it to go but well, I’m alive I guess.”

He scratched the back of his neck. No, he needed to tell the truth of what happened. Maybe not the specifics of it (specifically the kissing part) but they needed to know. That was the only way they would be able to help him. They were his _friends_.

“Actually, I was about to tell Sam, but now you are here so I can tell you both now.”

“Is it okay, Peej? I-“

“Yeah, I’m okay Chainey, don’t worry.”

He took a deep breath.

“Last night I followed Owen to his new hideout…”

 

\---

 

Grunting, a hand peeked from under the sheets as it grabbed the cellphone resting on the nightstand next to the bed. The teenager looked at the hour- ten AM in the morning. It wasn’t that late for a Saturday morning.

His house was empty once again; ever since his first kidnapping his family has let him rest in the house as much as he wanted and Bastian didn’t complain at all, some days he just wanted to lay on bed and sleep them off.

Bastian wasn’t able to have a good night of sleep- his dreams were full of Owen stalking him, cutting his fingers off- he didn’t even want to think about it.

The teenager stared at the scar he had in the inner part of his arm, flinching when he remembered how exactly it was how he got it; his lips burned.

 

 _I am a Monster_.

Bastian bit his lip harshly, the feeling of Owen’s lips touching his resurfacing once again leaving his lips tingly. He couldn’t make sense of what happened- he shuddered even thinking about it his stomach going cold and his heart beating faster. He bit his sheets as he felt his muscles go tight, biting harder waiting for the feeling of dread and general awfulness pass.

He let go of the sheets, feeling incredibly exhausted after the memory finally passed, and yet it still left a terrible feeling on the bottom of his stomach.

And now, Parker had gone to “deal” with Owen, the thought gave Bastian a stomachache.

 

“But, what are you planning on doing?”

“…I can’t tell you”

“Peej, please”

“Just- just trust me, okay?”

Bastian felt guilt and horror trying to think of what might have happened to Parker- he should have come with, but there was nothing he could do to help. And yet, he was terrified for Parker’s safety.

 

Something hit the window all of sudden, scaring the teenager and making him fall off his bed. Gathering himself and trying to shake his anxiety off, he got up untangling himself off the bed sheets when he heard something else hitting the window again.

Bastian went over to the window looking down, spotting the familiar small hooded figure easily now.

“Hey, Bastian!” Parker almost yelled from his position down on the garden, waving his hands to the teen. Bastian felt a weight lift off from his chest when he realized that Parker was still in one piece.

“Hey Peej, I’ll open the window for you.”

After Bastian opened the window Parker proceeded to climb up once again like he did last time. The teen noticed Parker’s face was covered, his hoodie up and with a surgical mask covering his mouth and nose effectively hiding himself to everybody.

“PJ, I’m so glad to see you!” he said as he hugged Parker tightly, the small teen returning the hug back. “I was so worried for you last night, Peej.”

“I told you Baz, I’m okay. How did last night go?”

“Oh, it went okay,” they stopped hugging as Parker pulled his hoodie down, but he didn’t take off his surgical mask. “We watched movies pretty much all night, I couldn’t spot your friend though.”

“Did you see someone that was freakishly tall?”

“…Yeah.”

“Yeah, that was him.” Parker chuckled slightly. “Yeah, he told me you had a pretty okay night, I’m glad. So, what movies did you went to –“

“Peej,” Bastian said sternly. _Oh, no_. Parker thought as he stared at Bastian feeling guilty.

“Are you okay? What happened, did your plan work?”

“Not- Not really, to be honest. It could have gone definitely _worst_ , but it didn’t go exactly as planned. I’m alive, anyways- well, _sorta_ , hah…”

“Parker, we need to talk about this.”

“About what-“

“About- About this entire thing! About you!” Bastian seemed more worried than angry and Parker could understand why. Bastian didn’t know anything that happened to him for the past months- he would be worried too.

“How did… how did this happen?”

“I-“ Parker scratched the back of his head still not removing his mask, Bastian took notice of this.

“What’s with that, what happened?”

Parker bit his lip, removing it revealing the scars he had on his mouth. Bastian eyes went wide, faltering.

“Owen did it. Look- I- I’ll tell you about where I have been, about what had happened.” Parker looked sadly at the ground. “It’s not fair to keep you in the dark.”

Bastian opened his mouth as to say something, but then stopped.

“It’s okay,” Parker encouraged. “Go on.”

“Well…” Bastian sounded uncomfortable, trying to hold on his tears as he remembered the painful memory of Parker dying.

“How did it happen? How- how did you… turn into this? How much time it passed since you- you died?”

 

Parker bit his lips feeling once again the stitches going across them, thinking.

“I don’t know how much time it passed. I don’t know why it happened at all, either. I just- it happened. I didn’t even know what I was until the Palmer’s Institution found me.”

“The Institution found you?”

“Yeah- they found me almost immediately after I ‘woke’, then they dragged me there to study me. Apparently they never saw anything like me before, so they kept me there to study me.”

“Oh,” Bastian felt awkward, not sure what to say but listening intently.

“I remained there for a while until, uh- there was an accident.” Parker didn’t even notice him clutching his chest, the hoodie twisting under his palm. “After that I went to live in another place, but I still work with the Institution. When Owen went loose, I was told to investigate and try to do something about it- which is what I have been doing lately. It- It hasn’t gone well.”

Bastian breathed in an out, trying to figure out how to ask his next curiosity. He was worried about Parker, he still couldn’t believe the teen was actually semi-alive.

“Does it hurt, whenever you are wounded? Like the other day that you were pierced- did that hurt?”

“It doesn’t hurt, really. It just- I still can feel things but it doesn’t really hurt; it’s pretty strange.”

“Do you- can you… infect people?” Bastian felt guilty he asked that, because he felt he was implying Parker as nothing but just another zombie, but his morbid curiosity (and desire to understand his friend’s condition better) overcame him.

“Like a mindless? No, not at all; it’s some sort of weird mutation of the virus- I don’t know. They never had the chance to find out more because the Owen situation took priority.”

That made Bastian feel better, at least he wouldn’t have to worry about turning into a zombie due to Owen’s terrifying kiss.

“Is there… anything else you want to know?”

“No I just- I’m just happy you are okay, PJ. I’m really sorry.”

“For what?” asked Parker slightly confused.

“For having to go through this alone.”

Parker smiled. “It’s okay, I’ve been hanging. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner.”

“Do you plan on telling Davey?”

 

“…Yes. Yes, but not yet. I want to deal with Owen first though. Another one of my friends- she is alive though- is going to the Institution and-”

Parker felt how Bastian pulled him into a hug, the small teenager’s body feeling the warmness of Bastian’s grip.

“I’m just glad you are okay… I missed you a lot.”

Parker closed his eyes returning the hug. “I missed you too.”

 

\---

 

It had been a long time since Samantha actually stepped foot in the Institution, ever since she was assigned to work with Parker (and Chainey later on) she had been living with them on the other side of the city. She would only send reports to Noah via email, but she felt strangely at home when she was inside of the gigantic building.

She stepped out of the elevator into the office with her handbag at slinging from her shoulder, strutting towards the front desk nonchalantly.

“I already told you- if it isn’t a life or death situation then I think you can handle it without me babysitting your way through it, so if this is just another one of your ‘Oh mister Fei I think I dropped my cellphone in a pile of guts again’ I swear to god I-“

“Hello, Noah.” Samantha interrupted Noah’s ranting, prompting the young man to look up from his incredibly messy desk discovering that it wasn’t one of the usual workers.

“Hey Sam, thought you were someone else for a second there.” He annoyingly gathered the papers scattered around his desk, putting them away as he continued to type in a computer. “What’s up?”

“Lots of work, huh?”

“You wouldn’t believe it- I have to do everything around here.” He furiously typed something in the computer, rubbing his nose bridge tired. “What brings you here? I haven’t seen you around in a long while, Sam.”

“Well yeah, but I need to talk to Lazaro-“

Noah stared at her slightly surprised for some seconds, then going back to typing whatever he was in the computer.

“Sorry Sam, but Lazaro isn’t really in the mood right now.”

“What? But he knows me, Noah, he knows that I-“

“He is ill, Sam.”

Samantha bit her lip, shifting uncomfortable on her place. “How… is he?”

“Bad, Sam. If I am honest with you…” the man sighed. “I don’t know how much he has left. It can’t be much.”

“Noah, don’t say that… I’m sure something will come around.”

“Always so positive Sam, never change.” Noah cracked his fingers as he began to arrange neatly the stacks of papers on his desk. “What did you want to talk to him, anyways? I’m sure I can help you.”

“Well,” Samantha rubbed her neck trying to figure out what to say. She felt far less nervous being around with Noah rather than being with Lazaro, but she was still anxious about the entire thing. “Noah, the Owen situation is going out of control. PJ and Chainey are not enough to stop him- there needs to be something done.” She bit her lip.

“And I agree. I have tried to convince Lazaro that we need more than Marianne to deal with this problem, but well, you know how Lazaro is.”

“What does he even plan to do- this is just going nowhere.”

“I don’t know Sam,” he rubbed his eyes in frustration. “I honestly don’t know what to tell you. Tell you what, I’ll talk to him once again after he wakes up, then I’ll give you a call.”

Samantha smiled. “Thank you Noah.”

“Now run along or I’ll put you to help me out with all of this.”

 

The young woman made her way back to the warehouse, disappointed that she couldn’t get more answers from the Institution. The current situation infuriated her, it seemed like Lazaro was just having some sort of tantrum that was leading to everybody getting hurt.

“Dangit,” she whispered to herself while frowning.

“Excuse me, is there someone here?”

Samantha immediately turned to the source of the voice, her eyes wide with surprise.

“Ah, my apologies darling, I didn’t want to scare you!”

The woman in front of her was taller, her skin pale and her hair being an orange/red color. Samantha recognized this woman, her stomach felt heavy and chills ran down her spine.

“How rude of me, to not introduce myself! My name is-“

“Marianne Sutton, right?”

Marianne faltered for a bit, but smiled wide. “Ah, my apologies, I can’t seem to recall knowing you-“

“We don’t. I just- I heard about you, at the Institution.” Samantha voice was low with a faint smile (a nervous one). “I’ve heard about your work.”

“Oh, I’m very flattered sweetheart!  But after all, thanks to me the Institution has been running smoothly.” Marianne laughed content with herself, Samantha just stared.

“My apologies, cupcake! What is your name?”

“Samantha Hyde.”

“Oh, you are the agent that was assigned to Parker Jones, right?” hearing Marianne say his name somehow made Samantha sick to the stomach. “So that’s why you were wandering here all alone. Figures!”

“I’m sorry, can I help you with anything?”

“Ah, yes!” Marianne’s face illuminated with joy; she was far more different than Samantha imagined her. Considering what she had done to Parker, Samantha found Marianne to be very… cheerful. It was incredibly disturbing. “You live with Parker Jones and Anthony Chainey, right?”

“…Right?”

“I must talk to Anthony, you see. I have… a proposition for him.”

An alarm went off in Samantha’s head.

“What kind of proposition?”

“It’s kind of personal, really.”

 _This woman is very dangerous,_ Samantha eyed the woman in front of her examining her. It was strange- she looked like one of those really sweet suburb housewives.

“Well, whatever it is you can’t- he isn’t here at the moment.”

“Oh? And where can I find him?”

“I don’t know- they just kinda run around doing their own thing.” She lied, her face expressionless.

Marianne smile was more sarcastic than anything now. “You don’t know? What kind of agent are you?”

Samantha shrugged not bothered by Marianne’s comment. “You’ll have to find him another day.”

“Very well then, I’ll return another day.” She waved, making her way to the opposite direction she came from. “See you later, Samantha!”

“Later,” Samantha whispered behind her breath. It wasn’t until she was sure Marianne left that she made her way to the warehouse, opening it silently and closing it behind her. Sighing, she placed her handbag in the table, rubbing her eyes tiredly.

The young woman walked towards one of the rooms, silently opening the door inspecting the inside. Chainey still was sleeping, the poor kid was too tired after staying awake the previous night.

As if Owen wasn’t enough, now they would have to deal with Marianne.

It was going to be a long day.

 

Marianne silently followed Samantha to the warehouse, smiling the moment she saw the young redhead enter the building silently. Writing down the address, Marianne left happily knowing that at least she knew where she could gather her new subject.

Oh, she would have so much fun!

 

\---

 

The past few days have been pretty uneventful in Bastian’s case, if you didn’t count the daily visits he got from Parker. Bastian has insisted that Parker shouldn’t get so close to him since the danger of being spotted always existed, but the dead young man insisted; he wanted to make sure Bastian was okay and to know if Owen had done anything to him.

He wasn’t sure if Owen was going to continue harassing him, especially after the “kiss” incident (he shuddered even thinking about it); but Owen was incredibly unstable and unpredictable, he would have to wait and see.

It was Monday already, and with his backpack slinging off one of his shoulders Bastian was ready to go to school; he didn’t have any encounter with Owen on the way there but he was still incredibly wary.

 

“Hey Baz! Over here!” Davey shouted from the football field, kicking the ball to the ex-football captain. Bastian managed to stop it with his hands, but it still hurt having done so.

“Jeez Davey! You would be a great striker, you know.” Bastian said as he playfully threw the ball to Davey once again.

“Nah, Fiend McGee is already going to try for that. Have you seen his kick? Dude can break the fucking wall.” He kicked the ball around a little. “I am not even sure if I want to enter the team once again.”

“What? Why not?”

“I don’t know- it’s odd. I just don’t want to do anything at all since, well you know…”

Bastian gulped, feeling guilty. If he could he would tell Davey about how Parker wasn’t dead-dead, but he knew very well it wasn’t the time.

“I’m thinking of joining the team again.” Bastian spoke, grabbing Davey’s attention.

“Are you sure man? After everything that has happened… no one will blame you if you decide not to.”

“No, no. I think it’s time; besides I am tired of sitting around and not doing anything.”

“Well,” Davey smiled, picking up the ball. “If you join, then I’ll considering in joining. After all, you are a terrible captain. I don’t even know why they chose you!”

Bastian smiled, hitting the brunette very softly on his side jokingly. “Says the guy that smashed his face against the goal last year!”

“Shut up!”

 

Micah hated Mondays. Well, okay, he hated everyday but Monday’s was some sort of special kinda hate for him. He _loathed_ Mondays as cliché as it sounded, but even so his father pretty much forced him to go to school anyways.

“Hey, cocksucker!” Ah yes, one of the main reasons he hated school.

Micah tried to ignore Alan, Blake and Sean as he made his way to school but the taller teenagers simply refused to stop their teasing.

“How was the weekend for you, eh? Crying over your girlfriend’s grave?” Micah teeth clenched, his nails digging into his palms. “Or maybe you just locked yourself in your room crying all over everything?”

“You already sent me to the hospital again- do you want a fucking lawsuit or what?“

“Oooh watch out Alan! His father is going to sue you!” Sean laughed, as they approached the small teen.

Micah refused to look at them in the eye, but Alan simply grabbed his wrist and forced him to do so.

“Come on Micah, don’t be such a pussy. Can’t take some little beating? How sad.”

“Let go of me-Ah!” Micah felt Alan’s nails digging deep on his arm, flinching as he tried to get away from the teenager’s grip.

“Now listen here you little-“

A ball hit Alan straight in the face forcing him to let go from Micah as he fell to his ass on the grass. His nose was bleeding as bruises began to form on his face.

“Alan! Are you-“

“What the fuck do you think you ARE doing?!” Davey yelled running towards the group with Bastian following close, and they looked pretty angry.

“Oh shit- it’s Jones! We have to run!” Alan scrambled to his feet as the trio ran away, leaving Micah sitting on the ground with a sore arm.

“Are you okay, Micah?” Bastian helped the small teen up as Davey gathered the ball once again.

“Fuckers… I thought I dealt with them already.”

“It’s okay guys- don’t worry. I’m okay.” Micah’s voice was low and hurt, and Bastian could see right through that.

“Are you sure? It seems like they need a little reminder of why that-“

“I said I’m okay! I don’t need your pity!” Micah practically stormed away from the pair, making his way to the building.

“Do you think he is okay?” Davey asked with concern, not exactly sure of what to do.

“He needs time, Davey.” Bastian passed his fingers through his hair. “We all need some alone time once in a while.”

 

“Fucking Jones- he just ruins everything. This is going to leave a nasty bruise!” yelled Alan as he hid along his friends behind the bleachers.

“Come on man, you were practically asking for it. Dude already beat you up once, are you surprised that he-“

“Shut the fuck up, Sean!” he rubbed his temples in exhaustion. “Making this kid’s life miserable was fun until Jones stepped in.”

“Whatever. We need to head to class, anyways.”

“Yeah yeah- let’s go.”

As the trio left to the main building, a small hooded figure observed the entire series of events unfold from the other side of the metallic gate, his red hair poking from his hoodie.

 

\---

 

“Alright, algebra done.” Bastian threw the notebook to his bed as he reclined on his chair cracking his fingers after he finally managed to finish his homework. Yawning he looked at the window- it was already dark out, but Parker hadn’t showed up. He figured that since it was a school day he would come at night instead of in the morning, but Bastian wasn’t exactly sure. He kept the window closed so he knew immediately when Parker arrived.

The teen felt pretty tired, turning his computer on with the intention to browse the internet.

 _Beep Beep!_ His phone rang indicating a message has reached him. Lazily, the teen grabbed the phone to inspect the message.

It was Nick, another one of the members of the football team in his school; it was strange to receive a message from him, since normally he wouldn’t do so unless it was seriously important.

 

[18:15:37]Werewolf Nick WOOF WOOF ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ: Captain?? Are you there???

[18:15:40] Werewolf Nick WOOF WOOF ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ: Captain plz pick the phone right now

[18:16:37] Werewolf Nick WOOF WOOF ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ: Bastian seriously pick up right now!!!!!

[18:16:50]B. Nightingale: Nick?? What’s wrong??

[18:17:00] Werewolf Nick WOOF WOOF ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ: Oh thank goodness youre ok!!!!

[18:17:15] Werewolf Nick WOOF WOOF ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ:  Turn the tv to the news rn

[18:17:30]B. Nightingale: ??? Ok

 

Bastian immediately turned the television on, dread filling him for some reason as he felt vertigo. It didn’t matter what channel it was in, the news was showing in pretty much every local channel, Bastian could feel his stomach drop as he heard the broadcast.

_“We have breaking news that this afternoon, four teenaged bodies have been found in the school grounds of Sovereign City High school.”_

Oh no.

_“Two of the victims have been identified as 10 th Grade students Alan Henke and Blake Foley. However, injuries to the remaining victims have rendered them virtually unrecognizable. All four victims appear to have been students. ”_

_Oh god no._

_“The signature ‘O’ painted on the school’s flag, coupled with the excessive nature of the crime, has lead to speculation that these killings may be related to the string of grisly murders that have been reported as of late. The Sovereign city police department has declined to comment at this time.”_

The phone began to beep with messages again, but Bastian couldn’t hear them. His hands shook as his vision began to twist around, blurring at the edges as he tried to not fall over.

He picked up his phone, but instead of checking the messages he went directly to calling.

There were two people he knew Owen would go after.

 

“Baz? What’s up?” Davey answered nonchalantly on the other side of the phone, Bastian felt a great weigh lift off from his chest.

“Baz? Baz, what’s wrong, what is-“He hung up feeling as he was in autopilot, immediately dialing the other number he was worried for. His breaths were shallow as his heartbeat went up, he felt his body cold.

_Pick up, pick up, please, please pick up…_

“Hello!”

“Micah! Thank god you-“

“This is Micah you are calling. Right now I’m not here, so if you wait after the beep to leave a message and I’ll see if I want to call you back. Goodbye.”

Bastian felt his world crumble as the beeping on the line finished.

“Micah? Are you there? I need you to pick up the phone- right now. Please just- pick up the goddamned phone!”

He ended the call immediately, biting his lip strongly as his nails dug deep into his palms until they turned red, his body shake with extreme hear.

“Fuck…” he dug his nails into his scalp as he crouched on the carpet of his room.

“Fuck!”


	9. The Stand

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They deserved to die.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bastian seeks confrontation.

He had always been unnerved by guns, and he wasn’t exactly sure why. It was probably the fact that it was seem normal for everybody to have one ever since the zombie virus, or the fact that it was a tool specifically made to kill- whatever it was, the fact that his father owned a gun unnerved Bastian a lot in many ways.

And yet he was holding it in his hands as he walked through the dark empty streets of the city.

It was mostly instinct, running to his parent’s bedroom and retrieving the gun, and it was pure luck that no one saw him do so even as he climbed out of the window (couldn’t risk anyone seeing him, or they would stop him).

His body was heavy, he barely registered what was happening around him anymore he was too blinded by his own confusion and rage. It has gone too far, _too far_. What started as a traumatic experience had become his own worst nightmare, something he could have never imagined would ever happen at all.

It was cheer random luck that Bastian managed to find Owen at all, the short teenager licking his bloodied fingers in a dark alley not too far away from the abandoned district. He was hunched, making incredibly disturbing sounds while he licked his hands; he didn’t seem to realize Bastian had spotted him, something the teenager used for his favor.

 

Without even thinking, Bastian steadied his gun and shot- the sound vibrated through his guns as a buzzing appeared, adrenaline running through his veins as he shot again, and again. He didn’t even really aim- he was too out of himself to even realize what he was doing.

He practically panted, dropping the gun as it clattered to the ground as his eyes focused, becoming aware of what he had done. His eyes slowly traveled to where Owen was hiding, his heart beating frantically.

Owen lay with his stomach on the ground, hissing as he tried to get up only to slip again with his own blood; eventually Owen managed to use the wall as a support as he slowly got up, and Bastian managed to see the exact damage he had inflicted on the killer.

The three shots had managed to hit Owen,  one of them hitting straight in the left knee bone shards poking out of his wound as the blood seeped to the floor- however, it was where the other two shots landed that caught the shooter’s attention.

The other two shots hit Owen on the stomach, breaking the skin and making a vertical slit wound across his torso. Owen’s intestines began to peek out of his abdomen hanging on the air as the adolescent tried his best to prevent them from outright falling out with his free hand, hissing as he stared at Bastian with pure hate.

“I gotta admit Baz,” Said Owen as he tried to shove his guts inside of his body again barely standing. “I didn’t mark you as the type to do that.”

 

Bastian felt the need something, he felt the need to chew out Owen, to curse him and to tell everything that has been burning him for the past weeks- he wanted to scream until his throat went raw because how dare Owen do this, how dare him put him in that situation. He felt his teeth chatter as his eyes burned- he wanted to say something.

And yet, a choked sob escaped his mouth so softly Owen didn’t even notice it, the wounded boy just trying to prevent his guts from falling to the floor.

“Why-“ eventually Bastian found enough strength within himself to actually speak rather than just make strange sounds, and he was going to take the opportunity. “Why did you- did you do that.”

Owen remained in silence, simply staring at the puddle of blood forming beneath his feet.

“You-”

“You know why.” He hissed, taking a couple of incredibly shaky steps towards Bastian while his organs jiggled on his hand. “They deserved to die.”

“They deserved-“ Bastian clenched his teeth as he hunched, feeling his entire body shake with pure absolute rage and horror. “They didn’t _deserve_ -“

“They had to die.”

“No! They didn’t! What is wrong with you, they- they were _teenagers!_ ” Bastian shouted back, feeling the adrenaline once again. “No matter what they did they didn’t deserve it! You have no right to decide who deserves to live!”

“I’m fucking tired of you, Baz.” The undead ripped part of his hoodie, tying it up around his torso as a makeshift bandage to keep his guts from falling until he had time to properly stitch himself up. He walked as fast as he could towards Bastian, grabbing the still bloodied saw he used in his latest killings as he approached the teen. “Make up your fucking mind.”

“What-“

“I saw you. I know you know those assholes were wrong!” Owen slightly hunched over, trying to regain his balance as he felt his insides jiggling inside of him. “So it was an act… you don’t really care, do you?  You are just like fucking everybody, like every person in this garbage planet. If you really cared then you would be happy I killed them.”

“What kind of insane logic is that?!” Bastian pressed the sides of his head with his palms, feeling as if the world was blurring itself out with intense hatred and confusion. “I don’t want anyone dead! That is not what I am- I- I can’t believe this-“

Owen threw himself to Bastian, tackling the teenager to the ground harshly with his saw dangerously pressed against Bastian’s neck, drawing some dots of blood; the taller teen tried his hardest to keep Owen away but it was useless- if Owen truly wanted to kill him he could do it in one swift motion.

“You are the bane of my existence, Nightingale.” Owen couldn’t help but spit some blood. “What am I going to do with you?”                                                                                 

“Ksh-“ Bastian grunted- he felt pathetic at how he couldn’t hold his own against such a small person- at the fact that Owen was just letting him live for fun, he could shop his head off whenever he wanted. “Micah- h-he-“

“Oh,” Owen smiled as blood drew from the corner of his mouth, his organs still were slipping from under him but at the moment he didn’t really care. “Is that was his name was?”

Bastian eyes went wide, his grip slightly slipping.

“Man that was fun, they’ll need dental records to identify him!”

 

Gritting his teeth together Bastian used every single bit of his strength to push Owen off from him, catching the redhead by surprise as he went to retrieve his gun. Yet, the redhead knew that he was going to reach for the weapon, allowing him to retrieve it before Bastian did.

In one swing, Owen used the gun to punch Bastian’s face with force knocking him into his back, huffing.

“You know what?” Owen hissed, scooping his guts with one hand as he violently shoved them inside of his body once again. “You win. You’ll obviously are never going to do it so whatever.” Owen pointed the gun to his own head.

“Well, see ya later Baz.”

He pressed the trigger.

 

\---

 

Samantha twirled the pencil between her fingers, biting her lip as she stared to the wall in the kitchen of the warehouse.

Ever since Marianne had ‘stopped by’ asking weird questions she had felt very uneasy; Noah had told her about what she had done, but Samantha didn’t expect Marianne to be so… _unnatural_. As if something from her demeanor just wasn’t normal in several levels.

 

_“He is still in shock after what happened, you have to be very aware of that.”_

_“I am aware, sir.” Replied the young redhead as she solemnly looked to her boss._

_“If he gets mad, he could easily eat you up.”_

_“Sir, I am a necromancer. I know what I am dealing with. I won’t disappoint you.”_

She would never regret working with Parker, being able to become his friend- he was far too young it was unnerving. However she wished there was something else she could do to help him- it didn’t help that Marianne started doing her rounds again.

Samantha didn’t even think of telling Parker that Marianne had found her so close of the warehouse- not yet anyways. She knew very well that was the least thing she needed for the undead teen.

She sighed, stretching her arms. There were many things to think about- but they couldn’t get anything really done in any sense until Owen got deal with.

Chainey brought her out of her trance as he walked full in disguise towards the door of the warehouse.

“Wait- where are you going?” Samantha perked up- it wasn’t normal for him to simply leave alone.

“I’m bored, I want to go to the city.”

 

Marianne’s face flashed on Samantha’s head.

“Wait, I-“

Chainey turned curiously to the young woman.

“I don’t think it’s a good idea.”

“Huh? Why?”

“I just-“ She bit her lip. “I have a bad feeling? Please don’t go, Chainey. I’m really anxious tonight.”

She felt guilty, but it wasn’t technically a lie- she has been pretty anxious lately, considering everything that has happened.

Chainey eyed her, and then the door, silently nodding as he plopped to the couch to turn the television on. Samantha sighed in relief, as she tried to figure out if he should tell Parker about the Marianne situation.

 

\---

 

He held his breath- he didn’t need to breath at all but he held it anyways, waiting for the bullet to pierce his skull.

Confused, Owen pulled the trigger once again, but nothing continued to pour out of the gun.

Opening his eyes Owen frantically began to pull the trigger again and again but nothing happened; his hands shook terribly as he began to pant.

“No way,” he stared at the gun’s barrel, pointing it directly to his forehead and he kept pulling the trigger, dumbfounded that the thing was dry. “No freaking way.”

 

Bastian propped himself up with his elbows- his head burned and he was way too disoriented to do anything.

“Every time,” he clutched the gun against his palm so hard his skin began to break against the jagged edges of the weapon. “Every fucking time. _Every fucking single time_.” His eyes traveled to Bastian, the redhead shaking with absolute pure rage.

“This is your _fault_ ” Owen spat, throwing the empty gun to Bastian and hitting him straight in the face. “This is your entire fucking fault!”

Once again he threw himself to the teenager, this time however he used his full strength to bash his head against the concrete.

With a loud bash, Owen covered Bastian’s eyes with his bloodied hand, his other hand choking the teenager as Bastian struggled under Owen’s strength- but it was useless, he was inhumanly strong.

 

Bastian struggled to breathe, but no matter how much he tried air wouldn’t go through. His lungs began to burn, his head buzzing with pain in the dark. He could feel Owen’s blood on his eyes, his blood-scented breath as he was centimeters from his face- he knew he was going to die.

He gasped and grunted desperate for oxygen, clawing at his sides as he desperately tried to cling into consciousness.

The teenager felt jagged dry lips cover his mouth, one last kiss from Owen before he murdered him. Bastian processed it as the last thing he would feel before he died.

 

He felt himself go limp, giving up as his muscles began to relax, not even being dignified of one last sound as Owen didn’t stop- he wouldn’t stop until he made sure Bastian was fully dead.

 

Bastian felt how the weight above him was suddenly ripped off from him, rather violently it seemed and with it Owen’s lips pried off from his. The teenager violently gasped for air, feeling how the oxygen reached his hurting lungs, feeling how life began to return to him.

And yet, his body still felt heavy and awkward, the horrible buzzing from his head refusing to go away. He could hear voices, but it was as if he was underwater- he couldn’t understand what they were saying.

He heard screaming coming from his side, Bastian turned his head around his cheek pressed against the cold concrete. The teenager spotted two blurry short figures fighting against each other, but it took him several seconds to understand who they were, and what they were saying.

 

 _“How fucking dare you?!”_ screamed Parker, waving a sledgehammer ( _Peej? With a Sledgehammer? What a weird thing to see_ ) against the redhead, Owen barely being able to dodge the attacks from the brunette with one hand pressing his waist preventing his innards from spilling out.

“You kill all those people, and now you try to kill him?!” Parker lifted the sledgehammer with all the strength he could muster, the head traveling across the air cutting it. “You have been stalking my best friend for weeks!”

Owen tried to dodge but he flinched, feeling his guts moving beneath his palm and leaving himself open. The head of the sledgehammer connected with Owen’s head, sending the short teen flying across the empty street and crashing against the wall of a building.

“You killed all those people!” Parker repeated as he ran across the street catching up to Owen before he had any chance of getting up, he swung the sledgehammer hitting Owen in his torso again prompting blood to spill out from his wound.

“You attacked my friends!” he let go of the sledgehammer leaving it crash loudly against the concrete, grabbing Owen’s hurt leg and swinging him in the air, crashing the boy’s body violently against the floor- Owen couldn’t do anything but grunt.

“You attacked my _brother!_ ” Parker repeated the action, slamming Owen against the ground a couple of more times before he let him go, leaving the redhead shaking covered with pebbles, dirt and blood that continued to spill from his torso, leg, ears- everywhere.

“You’ve been stalking and tormenting my best friend for _weeks_!”

Bastian managed to stand up using his knees as support, staring at the scene unfolding in front of him. Parker was on top of Owen, punching the redhead nonstop on the face, stomach, throat- everywhere. Bastian could even see the blood splattering out of the scene, Parker’s fists covered in blood as he continued to violently punch Owen. The brunette grabbed the sides of Owen’s head, slamming it against the concrete several times with loud cracking sounds.

“If you think you’re gonna worm your way out of this one,” he continued to slam Owen’s head harshly, each time harder than the last one. “You are-“ He punched him on the face “very-” Owen’s ears began to spill blood. “Fucking-“ Owen tried to cover his face, but it was useless.

“ ** _MISTAKEN!”_**

                                                                                                                                                                                           

Parker now towered him, standing in front of the barely conscious dead boy huffing as his fists dripped with blood- Owen cowered in fear against the wall as blood continued to pour out of his wounds.

“We are not similar.” Parker huffed, staring down at Owen’s pathetic figure. “You pretend to have fucking humanity, but where was all this when you killed all those people?”

“Piece of shit. Look at you.”

Owen tried to make a run for it, only for Parker to stomp down on Owen’s mangled left arm.

“You are going nowhere, Owen.” Parker said as he pressed down hard on Owen’s arm, but the redhead simply _smirked_ at him, face full of blood and bruises.

“Wanna bet?”

 

Owen grabbed the sledgehammer that Parker had dangerously left lying around, but instead of using it to hit parker with it the redhead slammed it against his own left arm with enough force to tear it apart from the rest of his body, using Parker’s confusion and surprise to jump to a standing position as he using the remains of his strength to throw the sledgehammer towards Bastian.

The tallest couldn’t move- it happened too fast. He only saw the sledgehammer coming closer and closer every second straight to his head.

“Bastian-“

He was tackled by Parker, the sledgehammer missing their heads by mere centimeters crashing against another building instead leaving a huge dent on the wall.

“Bastian! Are you okay, are you-“ Parker suddenly realized something incredibly important, turning around only to find Owen was gone.

“Oh, no.” Parker shook with rage as he walked towards where Owen left his severed arm. “Oh, _no._ ” he gritted his teeth, his fists shaking with rage. “God fucking DAMNIT!” the teenager punched the wall leaving a rather large crack, as he breathed in and out trying to calm down.

“Peej, I’m sorry. I-“

Parker immediately turned around, hugging Bastian close but it was more of a protecting hug, surprising the tall teenager.

“Baz I- I went to your house and when I saw you weren’t there, I-“  Parker bit his lip harshly trying his hardest to not cry. “I heard about the dead students and I was- I was terrified you-“

“No, no I-“ Bastian swallowed trying his hardest to keep his calm. “I’m okay. I’m okay.”

“I-“ Parker buried his head on Bastian’s shoulder, they were both shivering. “I saw what he- what Owen did.”

Bastian stiffened.

“Do you… want to talk about it?”

It took Bastian a while to reply.

“No.”

“If you need to-“

“I’m okay.”

 

\---

 

Slinking into the warehouse, Parker stepped in the building covered in dirt and blood, with his sledgehammer on the side.

“I got your message,” Samantha said as she waved her phone on the air greeting Parker on the way in. “I would ask you why it looks why you were ran over, but I have the feeling you are about to tell us.”

“Yeah,” Parker seemed more upbeat than normal. Not happy, per se, but Samantha could tell that there was something Parker was fidgety about.

“You told us in your message you had a fight with Owen again.” Chainey replied from the couch. “You should have called earlier, I would have helped.”

“I know, it was an emergency- it happened all of sudden.” Parker seemed to have something wrapped in a cloth, but Samantha couldn’t tell what it was.

“There are good news and bad news.”

“Oh, I hate bad news.”

“Too bad- the bad news is that Owen got away again.”

“Peej, don’t worry, we’ll-“

“I’m not finished.” Parker seemed agitated, wiping his forehead from the dried blood- Samantha eyed the lump in the cloth, having the feeling that whatever it was had to do with Owen and why Parker wasn’t as down as he normally would be.

“Owen is slightly … incapacitated.”

Samantha and Chainey blinked in perfect unison, confused.

“What? Why, what do you mean?”

“Well,” he unfolded the cloth, leaving Owen’s severed left arm on top of the table where the three were gathered at- Samantha covered her mouth with her hands, her eyes wide. Chainey leaned away from it, terrified that it would suddenly jump out and choke them.

“Is that-“

“Yeah.” Parker interrupted, leaning in and staring at the arm.

“Owen is pretty much armless.”


	10. Light them up

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The events from last night made rounds in his head, barely making sense of what had happened. PJ was there, Owen was there… too many things happened Bastian could barely keep up with it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bastian makes a decision, and Owen feels cold.

Every bone in his body hurt, his jaw especially for some reason- the teenager heard it could be due to stress. Even moving a little bit hurt a lot, so Bastian simply laid face down on his bed, the pillow being his best friend at the moment.

The events from last night made rounds in his head, barely making sense of what had happened. PJ was there, Owen was there… too many things happened Bastian could barely keep up with it.

Bastian shifted under the sheets, finally finding a truly comfortable spot on his bed as he sighed in exhaustion- he was still very tired. He felt a black hole in his stomach- people had died and Owen did it for him, Owen killed people-

 

Bastian violently sat on his bed, his chest pounding as he felt horror and bile rise up from the bottom of his stomach into his throat, his fingers shaking as the room began to spin.

How could he forget? That was the entire reason Bastian actually searched for Owen- Bastian remembered the hot gun in his hands after shooting the small teenager.

Bastian covered his mouth with his hand, leaning forward as he was sure he would puke at that moment.

A white light gently flashed on his phone- he had received a message. Bastian knew what it was about, it would be people telling him who the victims were, Micah name would be there. _His name was going to be there,_ and Bastian began to sob without even realizing it.

It took him a while to be able to manipulate the phone, his fingers shook uncontrollably as the screen was blurry, the teenager didn’t know if it was the tears or his mental state and he didn’t care. He touched the latest message he had, not even paying attention to who it was, he doing everything in autopilot at the moment.

 

[9:25:38]MICAH xhEaVyMeTaLx: Bastian? What’s wrong?

[9:25:59]MICAH xhEaVyMeTaLx: I left my phone in dad’s car last night, just saw it.

[9:28:40]MICAH xhEaVyMeTaLx: Bastian? What happened?

 

Bastian’s phone fell from his hands, hitting the ground and bouncing on the carpet as Bastian buried his head on his pillow while crying.

 

\---

Noah could have sworn he was still dreaming when he saw a dead arm being dumped on his front desk.

He blinked a couple of times, leaving his cup of hot chocolate (wife’s recipe!) on the desk, silent as he stared at the arm nonchalantly for about a minute until he finally raised his eyes, staring right at Parker.

“What is this.” He said, voice firm but still calm.

“This,” Parker said as he pointed to the arm, Noah took notice on the little pride Parker had in his face. “Is Owen.”

Noah looked at Parker, then back at the arm and then back at Parker once again.

“You didn’t chop him of, did you?”

“He is still running around, but he lost leg use and an arm. I guess he will be pretty easy to catch now.”

“Hm,” Noah said as he still stared at the appendage on his desk, apparently still not coming with terms that it was, in fact an actual limb from an actual person- a dead person, but still.

“Do you have any idea of where he is now?”

“Can’t be far, but he is small. He knows how to hide well.”

Noah wasn’t going to lie, that was a huge step from the wild goose chase they had going on for a while. He was about to ask Parker how exactly he acquired Owen’s arm, but the dead boy said it before he was even asked about it.

“It’s a long story, we got in a fight. He got uh,” Parker realized that Noah didn’t know Bastian knew about them, it probably was a bad idea to tell him at the moment.”-he got pretty banged up, long story short he lost usage of his leg and also this arm.” Parker stared at the arm silently. “It won’t be that hard to catch him now.”

The dead teenager rubbed his eyes with his palm, it had been an extremely tiring day for him and he needed some sleep and food pronto. Noah caught into this.

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah I just, I need some rest is all.”

“Well, you deserve it. It seems like we will get rid of this problem soon.”

Parker smiled weakly. “Yeah… yeah.”

Parker made a waving motion as he began to exit the office. “I’ll go scouting later tonight, he won’t go too far. Call you if I see anything, alright?”

“Yeah, sure.”

With that, the aware left the room leaving Noah with a severed arm in his desk. He gnawed on his pencil, as he sat back ready to call Lazaro.

That is, until there was a buzz from the entrance.

 

Noah looked at the screen, squinting at the figure who was standing in the doorway of the building.

 

\---

 

Bastian fell into his knees in front of the building as he tried his hardest to not sob.

The school outside wall was covered in photos, a quick and yet heartfelt memorial for those that were killed last night. Even if he knew he shouldn’t have been there, Bastian still went- he felt like it was his duty. After all, it was kind of his fault that they were killed, by Owen’s logic anyways.

He expected to see the bullies there, but even so seeing pictures of them as children and them laughing and goofing around in the wall still felt like millions of little hooks on the bottom of Bastian’s stomach, but he didn’t expect to see the other face in the wall.

 

Fiend. Fiend Mcgee. _McGee._

 

How could that happen? Fiend didn’t do anything at all, he didn’t- it made no sense. There was absolutely no reason for him to die at all. None of them had any reason to die but Fiend had even less reasons, it as something that was beyond him, something he didn’t deserve to be a part of at all.

Bastian dug his fingernails on the concrete, feeling blood coming from them as the reality of it hit him hard. The rest of the soccer teammates were there chatting, they didn’t know McGee that well and Bastian had to admit that he wasn’t that close to him either, but he was dead because of _him_.

He ran off, he didn’t even pay attention to his soccer teammates loudly asking where he was going- he didn’t even know where he was going at all, the only thing he did was run and run away from everything.

 

The teenager stopped, his phone ringing nonstop as he tried his best to not fall over. He couldn’t deal with this anymore. There had to be something he could do.

He blinked. Owen was severely injured now, Bastian had a chance to finally reach out to someone, and he knew who.

Decided, the teenager broke on a sprint once again, but this time with a goal on his head.

He rang the buzzer of the Institute main building, his legs shaking as he tried to regain his breath.

 

\---

 

Noah placed a cup of hot chocolate on the teenager’s hands, even if he wasn’t that good with teenagers Noah could very easily tell that the kid was extremely nervous and shaky.

“Okay, so let me get this straight,” Noah said as he stared perplexed at Bastian.

“You say that the killer, the Sovereign city killer ‘befriended’ you?”

“Yes,” Bastian said as he took a sip of the hot chocolate, taking a while to continue. “He… I am not sure, I think he hates me, but then he acts like we are l-“ Bastian gulped, shame filling him when he remembered the kisses that Owen had planted on him. “friends- I don’t know what he wants with me. He tries to kill me, but then does things for me and expects me to be his friend, but then tries to kill me again…”

Bastian rubbed his forehead, everything sounded so fucked up and ridiculous he couldn’t actually believe what he was saying.

“The guys? The student he killed last night- he killed them because of me. Because he uh, he saw that I had fights with them. I think he killed them so I would be happy but,” Bastian buried his face on his palms. “I’m not, I really really am not.”

Noah took a sip of his cup, sighing as he scratched the back of his neck.

“I can prove it,” Bastian said. “I know where he used to live, where- his haunting grounds. I know where he was last night. I can prove this. He is crippled- he doesn’t have an arm and he lost use of his leg. He- he isn’t as dangerous anymore.”

 

Noah eyes went wide, and nodded as he stood up with cellphone on hand.

“If you excuse me, I have some calls to make.”

Noah excused himself from the room, as he began to dial some numbers on his pone, bringing it to his ears as he bit his lip.

“Lazaro? You better come here quickly.”

 

\---

 

Bastian taped his fingers nervously on the white table, feeling asphyxiated in the small room he was placed in. About half hour after Noah had left, Bastian was moved to that observation room and no one had told him nothing about anything at all; it was becoming nerve-wracking.

The teenager began to wonder if he had made the right decision, until Noah entered the room once again. He seemed startled and tired, but Bastian wasn’t going to question a man he barely knew at all.

“Alright kid,” Noah sat down on the table, directly on front of Bastian. The teenager didn’t say anything, simply staring awaiting for at least _something_. “Here is how things are.”

Noah seemed to collect himself, prepare himself for what he was about to say and Bastian felt a knot on his throat. “We checked everything you said.”

Bastian stared down at the white table under him. “All the places you said he has been, all the places you said he met you at- there was proof that the killer had indeed been there. What you are saying is right.”

The teenager wetted his lips with his tongue as he waited the man to finish. “There is a really big factor here, though. You came to us, and Owen is actively seeking _you,_ ” Bastian felt his stomach drop. “Things are very, very delicate right now. The killer situation will be handled for us, however,” Noah took a deep breath as he looked straight at the teenager, Bastian finally looking up to lock his eyes with Noah’s.

“For your safety I am afraid I won’t be able to let you leave here.”

 

Bastian lowered his eyes. “I hope you understand, but your life has been in great danger ever since you were kidnapped by him the first time. Don’t worry, here you will be protected and he won’t be able to hunt you anymore.”

Bastian shifted uncomfortable on his seat, still looking down, silent.

“After the killer situation has been dealt with, you will be able to leave. We will inform your relatives about where you are, as well as your school so you won’t have any problems.”

Noah felt bad for the teenager who was still silently staring at the table, still.

“You’ll be okay, son.”

Bastian chuckled, as he took a deep breath and stared at the white ceiling above him.

 

\---

 

Davey sat in the couch in the Nightingale’s living-room, biting his thumb as he nervously tapped his foot against the floor as Bastian’s father paced around the room nervously, making calls just as his mother and Bastian’s siblings.

Bastian had been acting extremely weird and it was already dark and he was nowhere to be found, the last time Davey saw him was at the memorial of the victims at school and Davey was sure Bastian didn’t even know Davey was there. He suddenly ran off, and he wouldn’t answers his calls; his family got even more worried when calls didn’t enter at all.

There was nothing that Davey could do at the moment, simply help at being at their home as they tried to find Bastian.

“That’s it, I’ll call the authorities.” Bastian’s father said as he ran to grab the phone that was at the side of the couch, but even before he had a chance to touch it the phone began ringing.

Everybody stared at it in shock for some seconds, before Mister Nightingale grabbed it with shaky hands and answered.

“H-hello?”

 

He stayed silent for a while, everybody staring at him expectantly and with fears in their eyes; he covered one end of the phone as he turned to talk. “It’s the Institution.”

“What? Palmer’s institution?” one of Bastian younger siblings said as everybody stared in confusion.

“Yes… yes of course, you are speaking to him.”

Then he fell silent, his eyes going wide every second that passed as his hands began to shake having a difficult time holding the phone straight.

Everybody stared in silence, the minutes passing by feeling as if they were hours.

After what seemed like an eternity, the man said a soft “Thank you”, lifting the pone down as he covered his mouth with his palm.

“Dad…?” Another one of the siblings said, but he didn’t face them.

“Bastian… Bastian is,” He tried to compose himself. “He had been hunted by the killer… The institution is keeping him until they can- until they can deal with it.”

 

And all of sudden, Davey felt that same thing he felt at that skate park months ago.

 

\---

 

Owen felt cold for the first time in… years? Months? He didn’t know, he forgot how much time passed, he couldn’t really keep track of time at all. As far as he knew years could have passed ever since his arm got torn off, he didn’t care.

He pressed himself against the corner of the room, the damp wall wrapping around him as he tried more and more to sink into it- he wanted to be absorbed by the wall.

The small teenager shivered as he wrapped his spare arm around his legs, blood pouring down to the floor as he began to laugh. Why was he laughing? He didn’t even know, it was just- everything was hilarious to him at the moment.

He hadn’t felt that cold in a long time.


	11. My Songs know what you did in the dark

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Red vials of Blood

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Owen wakes up, Bastian talks with Parker, Parker plans, Chainey takes decisions and Marianne acts

Owen woke up, his cheek touching the cold damp wall; he woke up in a dizzy haze, his mouth tasting like blood (his own, unfortunately) and even more blood oozing from his leg and his arm. He shifted on his position, basically hugging what was left of himself against the cold corner of the ruined room.

 

The teenager had no idea how much time has passed ever since his confrontation with Bastian and Parker or even where he _was_ , the only thing the Aware could recall was him somehow crawling across the abandoned part of the city to seek refuge. He lifted his eyes to spot the half-ruined window, it was a sunny afternoon outside in the city, and if Owen was right it seemed like it would be dark pretty soon.

Owen dug on the pockets of his cargo pants, poking his fingertips when he found the needle he was searching for; he proceeded to rip the bottom part of his hoodie, his black undershirt showing as he wrapped the now ripped cloth on his stump, tying it up in a crude manner. Owen then lifted up his clothes, his organs poking out of his wound; he ripped off a chunk of his hair, shoving his innards inside of his body and using his own hair as thread; after some minutes of poking and stabbing himself with the needle, he managed to close the wound, giving him a nice scar that would never heal on the middle of his torso.

His fingers were full of his own blood, some nails about to come off as he licked his fingers. He was hungry, he was so hungry- he had gotten used to eat so much that now his body expected _more_ food than necessary.

The teenager panted as he finished licking off his own blood from his fingers and hand, ripping off his nails and crunching them with his teeth.

 

And yet Parker was the only thing that was in his mind.

 

\---

 

“What do you mean I am not needed anymore?!” Marianne shouted at Lazaro, the man wearing what Marianne could only assume were his pajamas: an oversized jersey (but, to be fair, with Lazaro everything was oversized) and some oversized pants as well. His hair was messy, his eyes were basically blood red and he just looked _ghastly._

Marianne would have chuckled when she saw him, and she in fact did; however right now she was fuming.

“I said,” Lazaro said with a huff, putting on his oxygen mask taking a breath from it; the corner of Marianne twisted on a small smile as he put it away from his face to keep talking. “That we didn’t need you in the field anymore.”

“Why all the sudden change, Lazaro?” she said with a scowl, uncrossing her legs and positioning herself basically at the edge of her seat, staring at Lazaro who could barely sit straight in his sofa. “You practically begged me to help you.”

“Don’t pretend you did much,” Lazaro said, taking a breath from his oxygen mask once again. “You just found him once, and he escaped. That’s all you did.” Even in his terrible state, Lazaro still looked like he would stab you at any moment.

Marianne felt her blood boil, her smile now a snarl.

“Besides, our little Aware is incredibly crippled at the moment,” it looked like Lazaro was enjoying every bit of it. “It is only a matter of time, mister Jones and some of our men will be enough to contain him.”

“You promised you would give him to me.” Marianne basically hissed. “You said-“

“I know what I said!” Lazaro seemed agitated, shoving the mask to his face once again, taking a deep breath. “I am not firing you. You are simply not needed on field anymore. The little you did on it, anyways.”

Marianne shifted on her seat.

“I still want you for… for the serum.”

Ah, Marianne could feel her lips form into a smile. “Ah Lazaro, so you do need me!”

“Can you do anything with his arm?”

“Well, it is just an arm. It is very tiny, but I think I can get a little from it.”

“Good.” Lazaro seemed relieved, he wouldn’t have to worry about the serum in a while; Marianne leaned in closer to the man as he put the oxygen mask once again and closing his eyes.

“What about our previous agreement?”

Lazaro slowly opened his eyes, staring at Marianne who seemed to enjoy making him suffer.

“The tall one… I haven’t had a chance to meet him.”

Lazaro remained silent.

“He is a big one, isn’t he? Do you know how much serum we could get from him? I’ve heard he has a narcolepsy problem as well. Imagine the medical findings we could get from him!” She stared with wide eyes at Lazaro.

“But of course, nothing of that can happen unless you give permission.”

 

Marianne smirked, hell if she needed Lazaro’s “Permission”, she would do it no matter what he said, but she just wanted something to throw at Lazaro face whenever he got too cocky, just to show him how low he had went.

Lazaro stared at the wall, as if he was thinking very carefully what to say. Yet, he didn’t even need to say anything, he just slowly nodded.

The woman practically jumped from her seat, gathering her things with a wide smile on her face.

“Well then, I better get to work with that arm, see if I can squeeze anything from it!” She made cute finger motions, as she walked over to Lazaro. She stood next to him, even if he was taller she definitely casted a shadow over him; her smile went wider as she just _stared_.

“What?” Lazaro spat out while still wearing his mask, Marianne just negating slightly with her head still smiling.

“Nothing, nothing,” Marianne walked towards the exit of the office, waving Lazaro in the way out.

“See you later, Laz! Take care of all that blood, by the way.”

Lazaro looked down, realizing that there was a lot of blood on his jersey, coming from his mouth and ears.

He took a deep breath, closing his eyes as he let the blood soak his clothes.

 

\---

 

Bastian lied down on the white bed inside of the room he was given. It was painfully white; there was absolutely nothing in the room to entertain himself. He had taken his phone, leaving him with no means of communication; there were books in his room that he could read but he wasn’t in the mood of doing anything at all, it had been just a day since the Institution contained him.

He sighed, staring at the white ceiling while he heard the door to his room enter; the teenager didn’t even bothered to pay attention since it probably one of the interns just asking him if he needed something.

“I’m fine, I don’t need anything, thanks.” He answered in auto pilot as he continued to stare at the ceiling.

“Bastian?”

 

He sat straight immediately, his eyes focused on Parker whose head was peeking inside the room.

“Hi…” Parker smiled shyly.

“Hi,” Bastian replied stunned. “Do you, uh- come in?” Bastian said sheepishly.

 

Parker nodded, as he entered the room and closed the door to it; Bastian sat in the edge of the bed as he stared at his dead friend, the teenager had only seen the boy in the dark of the night or when he couldn’t really make out his features, now with decent light Bastian could actually see the state of Parker.

His heart sank as he remembered how lively Parker was some weeks ago, he irradiated happiness and curiosity. Now Parker just looked _tired_.

“How are you feeling?” Parker asked the brunette, and Bastian wasn’t sure what to answer.

“I- I’m okay. Bored out of my mind, but okay- Owen didn’t hurt me.”  

“I’m so glad!” Parker smiled , but his smile quickly faded and his face twisted with worry. “Listen Bastian, I’m really sorry about all of this. Everything… none of this would have happened if I had managed to stop Owen long ago, but I wasn’t capable of doing that.”

“Peej, it’s okay. If I was in your position, things would have gone way worse, I assure you!” Bastian laughed, but it seemed like Parker was still upset about everything.

“Listen, Parker I’m sorry too.”

“What for?”

“I…” Bastian shrugged. “I don’t know. About the accident, when you, you know, when you-“ He couldn’t bring himself to even say it.

“It wasn’t your fault, Bastian. It was no one’s fault. It was an accident.”

“I’m sorry for you being alone, I’m sorry you couldn’t go to no one.”

Parker sighed.

“It’s okay. I learned how to deal with loneliness.”

 

Bastian could practically feel his stomach go cold when he heard Parker say that. God, how did it come to this?

“Have you thought about telling your brother?”

“No,” Parker said pretty firmly. “No, not yet. I can’t not yet.”

“Why not Peej? He is your brother, and-“

“Bastian, look at me. I don’t want him to look at me like this!” Parker ran his fingers through his hair, biting his lower lip. “Just, I’ll do it, okay? But when we deal with this Owen situation, right? Not yet.”

Bastian nodded slowly, his head low.

“Sorry about you being stuck in here,” Parker changed the topic pretty obviously, Bastian couldn’t help but chuckle. “It’s very boring, right?”

“Yeah, definitely, there is nothing to do here.”

“There is a library around here, you could read all the books, that’s what I did when I was here as well.”

“You were here?” Bastian perked up.

“Yeah, actually this used to be my room! Still white and boring as ever, it seems.”

“Really? Aha,” Bastian laughed. “I can’t imagine you being here, your room on your home was always colorful! This is just so dull.”

“Yeah, I definitely don’t miss this place! People checking on you every five minutes…”

“Wait, so you don’t live here anymore?”

“No, not really, I live in an abandoned warehouse.”

“Why, what happened? Why did you leave?”

 

Parker bit his lip, feeling his chest slightly burn.

“I… there was a little incident with one of the researchers here,” his hand went on to grab the hoodie at his chest level without even realizing he did so. “I decided I wouldn’t live here anymore.”

“That bad?” Oh, Bastian couldn’t possibly know just how bad it was.

“Yeah, but its okay, I like it where I live now. If I could I would bring you with me, but I am pretty sure I wouldn’t be allowed to!”

They spent the rest of the afternoon talking, about random things to movies that have aired ever since Parker died, to how his brother was doing- both of them carefully tiptoeing around any topic that might be related to Parker’s death or Owen, or the most recent deaths.

After a while, Parker excused himself since it was getting late and he needed to scout the city in search for Owen, and that night as Bastian went to sleep, he realized he didn’t feel so lonely anymore.

 

\---

 

“Alright,” Parker rubbed his eyes with his fingers, sighing deeply. “Here’s the plan.”

In front of him was a map of the city, and all around him were soldiers that worked in the institution.

When Noah told him that he would be the one to plan their moves for the next days, Parker wasn’t sure if he was going to be able to do it. But he had to, he had no idea for how long Owen would be incapacitated and they needed every second.

Everybody in the room paid attention to him, he was nervous as he tried to pretend it was as if he was giving a presentation on school. Except this time it was to catch a murderer.

Yeah, totally the same.

“From the information we have gathered in the past days, Owen has hiding places all over the city. What we are going to do is that we are going to have to search for him day and night, until we finally spot him. Right now he is crippled- he lost an arm, he can’t use one of his legs and has some head injury. Not to mention his organs are exposed, Uh.” He took a deep breath.

“Basically, we will begin by splitting into groups, every group is going to try and search for him in his old hiding places, and other groups are going to search for other potential hiding places. He likes to reside in abandoned buildings, most likely in the abandoned area of the city. Yet, we are going to have to patrol the city.”

 

The meeting wasn’t long, and Parker had managed to form a plan to scout the city. He would be scouting along with Chainey for areas they haven’t been before, Parker would spend the entire day if it was required until they caught Owen.

Some groups have already started scouting their areas, Chainey was still in the institution as he accidentally fell asleep once again; as he got up and got his metal bat ready, a woman approached him.

“Hello sweetie! I don’t believe we’ve met.”

Chainey tried to remember, had he met her? Well, not after his death anyways, and she seemed like she wouldn’t be easy to forget.

The woman was shorter than him (but again, everybody is always shorter than him), with long red hair, pale skin and big eyes, Chainey had to admit the woman was very pretty.

“Yeah, I don’t think we’ve met?” Chainey answered.

“My name is Marianne, sweetie.” The redhead extended her hand, which Chainey awkwardly shook. “What’s your name? I’ve heard a lot from you.”

“My name is Chainey.”

“Ah, Chainey. What a nice name.”

“I’m sorry, but- do you need anything? I am kind of late…”

“Ah, no, don’t worry sweetheart, it is just that I’m a researcher here and I haven’t heard of you- I’ve studied your kind, the Ferals and the Aware- and I just wanted to meet you.”

“Oh, well then, hello.” Chainey smiled as he shook her hand once more.

“Listen honey, I know you have a lot of work to do, specially right now!” Marianne smiled, her eyes gentle and lovingly looking at Chainey. “However, I was wondering if you could help me with some research later?”

“Research?” Chainey scratched the back of his head, feeling a cringe when he accidentally scratched the stitches of his wound. “What kind of research?”

“Sweetie, I am one of the researches that is trying to figure out if there is some kind of Cure to your condition.” Her voice was serious, but even so it was still soft and gentle. “I need your help; I need to analyze you and do some studies with your body, with your help we could be a step closer to find a way to treat the ones that weren’t as fortunate as you.”

 

Chainey stared at her in surprise.

“Studies? My body…?”

“It will be simple things, sweetie. Some blood samples, maybe some skin samples- the standard” Marianne smiled from ear to ear.

“Uh, couldn’t you ask PJ? He could-“

“No!” Marianne gasped. “Me and PJ… we used to be friends, but we had a big fight. I can’t ask him anymore. Besides, I’ve already made some studies with him; if I have another subject, we may find more things.”

Chainey hesitated, not exactly sure what to say.

“It will help a lot of people, Chainey.”

Chainey bit his lower lip.

“Well… Okay, sure, if it helps people.”

Marianne eyes went wide as did her smile, showing her white teeth; she hugged Chainey as tight as she could.

“Thank you! Let me take you to-“

“Whoa, hang on. I can’t right now. I- Can it be later?”

Marianne smile dropped a little.

“I’m sorry I just, I really need to go. But, let me make one round and then come back to you, right? I’ll ask for you.”

Marianne smile came back.

“Of course, sweetie. In the meantime, I will get my things ready.”

Chainey waved farewell to her, as he grabbed his bat, a radio and headed outside- He felt strange, as if something was incredibly wrong, but it probably as nothing.

 

“Chainey, are you there? what took you so long?” Parker voice resonated from the radio.

“Oh, nothing I just got a little caught up in the Institution.” The tall teenager replied as he continued to jump across the rooftops, making his way to the abandoned part of the city.

“Chainey, I don’t want you to hang in the institution so much.” Parker replied from the other side of the radio.

“What? You spent the entire day at the institution just today, why can’t I do that?”

“Look, don’t, alright? Just- trust me in this one.”

Chainey dramatically sighed into the radio, which prompted Parker’s reply, “Are you sighing at me?”

“Yeah Peej, I’m sighing at you.”

“Why? What’s the matter?”

“Look Peej, I’m just getting tired of not being told things and to just be told to trust you!” At this point, Chainey stopped running and was just standing in the middle of a rooftop as he continued to rant into the device.

“You keep running around without asking for help! I am even surprised that you let me help me today instead of running off and do your own thing!”

“Chainey, I’m sorry! It’s just, I don’t-“

“Look Parker, forget about it, alright? Obviously you don’t trust me enough, I get it.”

“Chainey, Its not about that! I-“

“See you later, Parker.” Before Parker could finish talking Chainey turned off his radio, as he stood under the stars, on top of the rooftop of that building.

He bit his lip, it was time he did things on his own.

 

\---

 

Marianne was getting her things ready when she heard a knock on her door; curiously she opened it, slightly surprised at who was outside.

“Chainey, sweetie! I thought you were going to scout along Parker?”

“Yeah,” Chainey said still upset with Parker and how he just didn’t trust him at all, surely the Institution wasn’t that bad. “Change of plans, I’m ready to help you.”

It was the most ridiculous revenge ever, Parker wouldn’t care if he went in and helped some woman with her research, but Chainey felt that it was a way to stick it up to him.

In some sort of ‘I helped the institution even though you don’t like them! Hah!’ way.

Chainey then thought it was the stupidest idea ever, but he couldn’t really back down now.

“Alright sweetie, please, come on in!” Marianne invited him, and he accepted. Chainey was surprised at how flowery and pink the room was, he didn’t register at first when Marianne stabbed a needle and injected something into his arm.

When he realized this, he tried to run away but he felt his entire body heavy, losing his balance as he crashed hard against the floor, feeling how he slowly started to lose consciousness as Marianne began to chuckle.

 

\---

 

Parker tried to communicate with Chainey to no avail, until he got fed up and decided to stop. Chainey probably went to blow some steam, and Parker couldn’t blame him.

“When I see him again, I’ll tell him.” He whispered to himself as he traced his fingers across his scar in the chest.  Parker promised to himself that he would end that nonsense about keeping secrets from everybody- if they were going to catch Owen, they would catch him the _right_ way.

 

Parker began to search for Owen in every building, not leaving not even a corner without searching, he would do whatever necessary to catch Owen, this nightmare needed to stop.

Something tugged at the teenager’s stomach, telling him something was not right. Parker had no idea what it was, and that feeling stayed for the rest of the night.

 

\---

 

Flowery patterns, pink ceiling, pink posters of the human body, her white gloves covered on his blood, his organs out of his body, the smell of tea and cookies on the air.

The color of his hair, the color of his skin, the color of his blood, her hands inside of his skin digging deep.

Red vials of blood.

His drool falling off from the corner of his mouth along with blood.

Parker telling him that the Institution is not safe, to not trust them no matter what they say.

 

As Marianne’s fingers kept digging into him, Chainey felt himself being ripped apart, over and over and over, until there was nothing left of him.

 

\---

 

Bastian woke with a jolt in the middle of the night, not even sure why. His room was locked, there was no one inside and it was in the dead of the night.

A feeling of anxiousness traveled through his stomach, a knot forming on his throat as he went back to sleep, the darkness of his room consuming him as he realized he would never be the same again.


	12. The opposite of Amnesia

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I made them remember. I made them remember how truly fucked up it is for people out there, for people like us.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Parker searches, Owen makes excuses, Marianne delivers.

The sound of his footsteps were the only thing audible in the night, hopping from rooftop, entering the abandoned buildings waiting for any trace of Owen- anything that would give Parker indication that the teenager had been there.  
He was close, so close, he could feel it. Parker had a feeling on his gut that this night would be the night where they finally captured Owen.  
The teenager was wild- he would not stop for a break in his search, caught in a rhythm of running, jumping, searching- and repeating. He would not stop, not until he found him.

The boy hadn’t been sure for how long he had been running, the dark sky and its stars told him it hadn’t been too long since he started his search. Parker eventually reached a part in town he had never seen, abandoned like the others- most likely due to its proximity to the barrier.  
Even in the dark, he could see the dark stains in the ground below him.

It was blood.  
Parker could feel himself getting pumped as he followed the streaks of blood until they reached one of the abandoned buildings; silently he entered the building as to not alert Owen, but quickly- there was simply no time to waste.  
Most of the rooms were ruined, and strangely enough Owen cats weren’t present; only the silence of the night and his very soft footsteps.   
Parker felt his fingers slightly shake as he approached the final room, the only one he hadn’t explored; he held his breath as he stepped inside.   
The wallpaper was peeling off on its own, greying due to the decay, the wooden floor having a couple of holes and putrid parts all over, rubble on the floor.  
There was a figure slumped in one of the corners, right next to the window, it’s black hoodie and blood gave Owen away.

Parker gripped his crowbar tightly, as he walked carefully towards the figure, being as quiet as he was capable of.  
“Hey Peej.”  
The teenager stopped dead on his tracks and almost dropped the crowbar out of surprise. Owen lazily lifted his head to see his pursuer, blood covering his face and his eyes lazily inspecting Parker, he was exhausted.  
“So you found me…” Owen reclined his forehead against his knees once more. “Didn’t expect you to find me so quickly, though.”  
The brunette stayed silent, inspecting Owen quickly. His body seemed so tiny curled up in that ball of himself, dried blood on the floor surrounding him and his clothes- he had never seen Owen so… fragile.   
“Owen, it’s over.”  
“What is?” Owen chuckled to himself sadly, the corners of his smile peeking from his face hidden in his knees.  
“All of this, Owen. It’s over, we caught up to you. You won’t kill anybody else… not anymore.”  
Owen laughed, but it was a tired laugh, as if Owen was barely keeping himself together at this point.  
“Do you really think it’ll be over when you catch me?” He turned to stare at Parker this time, still smiling. “Do you really think this will just end everything that is wrong in this city?”  
Parker stood firm, still gripping his weapon strongly with his hands.  
“Take a look at this miserable city, Parker. Everybody just tries to pretend nothing happened when the fucking zombies came over. They forgot. They pretended nothing happened at all.”  
Owen tried to stand up, gripping the wall with his remaining arm to help himself, his injured leg twisting and bleeding more with the crude movements.  
“I made them remember. I made them remember how truly fucked up it is for people out there, for people like us.” He hissed in discomfort as he felt his knee twist. “Besides, Parker, I know you know that there are even more fucked up things out there in this city.”

Parker blinked in slight confusion.  
“That institution that you work at, for example- I know what they did to you.”  
Without even realizing it, Parker brought one of his hands to his chest as his eyes widened. “How did you-“  
“Oh please Parker, I am good at stalking and getting information from people. It wasn’t actually that hard to figure out.” Owen’s smile disappeared as he noticed the discomfort on Parker’s eyes.  
“Why do you keep working for them, when they did that to you?”  
“I do not work for them.” Parker hissed as he gripped his hoodie harder, his fist now shaking.  
“Really? Because from where I’m standing, you’re basically their dog.”  
“I came here to stop you! Nothing more!”   
“Huh,” Owen stared out of the window for a while. “At least I would know when I’m being used-“  
“Stop this, Owen! Stop this!” Parker began to shout, waving his crowbar as he gestured. “Stop pretending you figured it out! Like you are the hero of the story! You- You’ve killed people! You are a murderer!”   
“I did it so people would understand-“  
“That’s bullshit, Owen! You keep creating these ridiculous excuses but, but we both know you just kill because you like to! You like killing! You don’t give a shit about anyone! You don’t give a shit about the Institution, you don’t give a shit about me- you just-“  
Parker tugged at his own hair in frustration as he attempted to calm down.   
“You said we were very similar. We aren’t. We really aren’t, Owen.”   
The brunette gripped the crowbar with both hands.   
“And I’m going to stop you.”

Owen looked over at Parker and his crowbar, the corners of his mouth twisting into a small smile.   
“Come on, Peej. I’m armless, I am in the verge of starving and my leg doesn’t work. Do you seriously think you’ll need that thing?”  
“I’m not taking any chances. We can do this the easy way, or the hard way.”  
Owen rolled his eyes. “You’ve watched way too many movies, Parker.”  
The redhead limped towards Parker, while smiling. “I’m coming, I’m coming.”  
Parker couldn’t believe it was that easy- Owen couldn’t give up that easily, that isn’t how Owen did things. He wasn’t sure what to do next, he wasn’t going to simply attack Owen just because, but the idea that it simply was THAT easy to catch him… it unsettled him.   
“Where to, Peej?” Owen smiled as he reached Parker’s side.   
“I’ll… I’m going to take you to the Institution,” Parker said still slightly unsettled as he turned around and began to mentally remember where he came from, or wondering if he should call the institution to help him with getting Owen to the main offices, he could-

He felt something very sharp violently lodge itself in the side of his neck, blood gushing from his wound immediately- Owen grabbed whatever it was that he stabbed him with and dragged Parker near him.   
“You didn’t think it would be that easy, right?” Owen said as he stabbed the dagger even deeper, Parker struggling to get free from it.   
“I am not going to let you take me to the institution so they can open me up like they did to you, Peej.” He twisted the knife. “I have dignity.”  
He twisted the knife once more, the sensation causing Parker to drop his crowbar. Shoving the brunette away, Owen grabbed the crowbar as he ran towards the window as fast as he could.  
“No,” Parker muttered as he stood up and pulled out the knife out of his neck, the blood gushing and covering his hoodie as he saw how Owen made a run for it.  
“No! Not this time!” Ignoring the gaping hole in his neck and the blood pouring from it, Parker ran as fast as he could with his knife in hand, just wen Owen was ready to jump out of the window and into the fire escape, Parker launched his body, crashing against the redhead and launching both of them outside of the window.  
Owen hit the ground first, his head crashing against the pavement harsh along with a loud “Tok” sound, Parker hit the ground immediately after but landed on top of Owen, the hit from the fall not being as strong.  
“Owen?” Parker climbed off the redhead, as he noticed blood began to pour out of Owen’s ears. “Owen-“  
“Fuck, fuck you Parker, just-“ Owen entire being shook, as if Owen was not capable of moving on his own anymore, blood poured from his mouth as well as he struggled to even talk. “Fuck you.”  
“Will you stay put for one second?” Parker exclaimed in exasperation, slightly content that at least he prevented Owen from running off once more.  
“Never,” Owen hissed his words with pure spite. “I will- I will always run away-“ He tried to crawl away as to prove his point but it was useless- he could barely move, the teenager could feel his insides torn apart. He could probably recuperate, but at the moment he couldn’t move at all.

Parker rubbed his dirt-covered face, sighing. He got his phone out, luckily only the screen was slightly cracked, it still was functional; he dialed it as he continued to observe Owen trying his hardest at crawling away, and failing.  
“Noah? This is PJ.” He said on the phone, reaching for the crowbar that was almost within reach of Owen- he couldn’t afford another accident.  
“I captured him. He can’t move, and he is unarmed. Yeah, we are at the old industrial district, the abandoned one, it’s… the 4th. Yeah, yeah I’ll keep him here, I’ll wait for you.”  
He touched the screen with his thumb, and the call had ended; after pocketing the phone on his pants once more Parker moved towards to Owen, who seemed to struggle to even stay awake at that point. Placing himself above him, Parker began to search through Owen’s pockets in search of anything the redhead could use to attack, but there was nothing of real importance.  
“Y-you are enjoying it, aren’t you.” Owen hissed from under Parker. “You finally did it. You helped the institution catch me. I bet you are really fucking proud of yourself, aren’t you.”  
“No,” Parker said as he sat on top of Owen to prevent him from even moving away, the redhead hissing as he felt his sore bones and organs churn inside of him, blood dripping from the crude stitches of his midsection.  
“Why the hell not?!” Owen asked, curling his fingers due to not being able to move.  
“I didn’t catch you earlier.” Parker replied, as he looked up to the stars in the sky.

\---

“I need all units to go to the old industrial district, at 4th street- immediately! I don’t want this freak to escape again, I want everybody that is available to go there right now!” Noah’s voice woke him up from his sleep, resonating not only on his room but in every room and hallway of the institution.   
Bastian rubbed his eyes, groaning until he realized what the voice just said.  
Owen was caught.  
Owen was caught?  
Owen was caught!

Bastian got up from his bed too fast, tangling himself with the sheets and falling to the ground, but he didn’t care. Owen had been caught.  
He stood up quickly, turning the lights on his room on as he noticed the clock on one of the walls. It was 4 am, but he was wide awake.   
After getting dressed, he ran out of his room. His first reaction was to find Parker, not putting into consideration that he was the one that caught Owen- he just wanted to go and talk to Parker.   
He ran across the hallway, not even thinking where he was going to- he was just so happy that everything would finally end, he would finally go back home, the nightmare would finally end, everything-  
Bastian crashed into someone, whatever they were holding on their hands fell to the ground.   
“Oh dear,” a feminine voice said as Bastian realized what just happened, as he collected whatever it was she dropped.  
“I’m so sorry! I- I should have seen where I was going-“  
He froze when he saw what was inside the box that fell, a bunch of crystal bottles with strange, crimson liquid inside- luckily none of the bottles broke.   
“Oh gosh, none of them broke, right?” the feminine voice said once again, and Bastian sighed in relief.  
“No, none of them miss, I’m so sorry I-“  
Bastian eyes widened as he saw the lady. She wasn’t too tall, very attractive, blonde hair that verged on red, very revealing outfit and yet she seemed like a mom from a commercial.  
That wasn’t what caught Bastian’s attention, however, but the blood in her face, fingers and clothes.  
“Is something the matter, honey?” The woman cooed, and Bastian looked away from the woman, paling over the blood; the woman realized what he was so nervous about, and chuckled.  
“Oh, I’m so sorry sweetie, I am just so used being like this, I constantly forget!” She smiled once again, but Bastian still remained in shocked silence.  
“Oh, don’t worry honey, I’m a researcher here. This,” she motioned her long fingers to the splatters of blood on her. “Is from a dead body… you see, I am researching for a cure and the like. That’s what in these vials here, part of the research.”  
Bastian nodded, letting out a soft “Oh,” but he was still slightly perturbed by it.   
“Now if you excuse me, honey, I need to take these to someone.”  
The teenager nodded, letting the woman pass. Suddenly, he wasn’t that awake anymore.

Marianne hurried, since she knew that Parker could come around pretty soon, and she needed to hurry up. The possibility of doing research on Owen was exhilarating, but time was running out.  
She was very well aware of the risks she had taken, but she needed to do her research, and Anthony Chainey had delightfully delivered. He was completely different from Parker in so many ways, Marianne didn’t regret her decision to perform the surgery.  
However, now she wouldn’t be able to operate on Owen. She wanted to, but she very well knew that if Parker saw her again and knew what she did, he would do far more than just stab her with a knife.  
Marianne bit her lip. This was it, she would collect the payment and she would leave. Lazaro didn’t even need to know she would leave- Lazaro would just keep her there to produce even more and more serum, he didn’t give a shit about her well-being.   
She hurried up through the hallway, until she reached Lazaro’s office.  
Without even knocking, she opened the door rather crudely.  
“What-“  
“Before you scream at me like you always do, Lazaro,” Marianne hurried towards Lazaro’s bed; he had a breathing mask as he lay down in bed with his phone at his side, the device was currently ringing with Noah’s messages. She pushed the device to the floor, and placed the box full of the vials at his side. “Here’s your serum.”

Lazaro simply eyed it, and then eyed Marianne.  
“You don’t have to thank me, you know.”  
“You still have work to do,” Lazaro said between huffs. “Owen has been captured, and I want you to examine him.”  
The corner of her mouth twitched.  
“What, isn’t this enough for you, Lazaro?”  
“Do as I say.”  
“I am starting to feel that you’ll die before you use all of these, Lazaro.”  
“Marianne” he hissed with hate, but Marianne simply shrugged.  
“I’ll get to it when he gets here.”  
Lazaro nodded tiredly.   
“Go,” he said.  
Marianne’s mouth twisted again, but she didn’t say a thing. The woman quietly left, closing the door as she did. She sighed, looking at her clock.   
She needed to leave, quickly.

\---

The first thing he became aware of was of the fact that he was puking blood. It had to be blood, the metallic taste lingering in his mouth as his own blood covered his tied up being.  
His movements were done without thought, no matter how much he tried to focus, Chainey simply couldn’t. Everything was red and flowery, red and flowery- her smile and her eyes focused on him as she dug into his body and-  
Nothing. He couldn’t do nothing. He was tied up to the cold steel table, he couldn’t move if he wanted to. He didn’t want to, he felt as if he saw everything through a pink tint, as if he was dreaming.  
But it wasn’t a dream.   
Marianne was gone, too. She picked up everything of hers, put it in a suitcase and went away. Where to, Chainey didn’t know and didn’t care.   
His head limped, his cheek pressed against the cold steel as more blood spewed from his mouth into the floor.


	13. Dreaming of Tearing you Apart

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He looked down at his feet, his soles covered in blood.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> They believed they won.

Parker’s eyelids were heavy, every minute that passed it made him sleepier, and he let himself fall asleep with his forehead pressed against the cool window in the backseat of Noah’s car.

For the first time in months, he was able to sleep in peace, knowing that Owen had finally been caught.

 

In another truck, surrounded by other cars all full of armed units from the institution, Owen was tied up to a table like an animal- every single part of his body that could move was tied up to the table under him with leather belts. Even his mouth was tied up with the thick leather belt, but even if it wasn’t he wouldn’t have said anything anyways. His eyes focused on the ceiling of the truck, as the guns of the units pointed to every corner of his body.

He could taste the leather that was covering his mouth.

 

Marianne could see from the distance the trucks and cars reaching the Institute, she only hit the pedal to accelerate, her car driving now faster through the empty streets of the city. It was a big enough city, and she had means to stay hidden. The woman was sure that even if he wanted to, Lazaro wouldn’t be able to properly look for her, the man seemed like he was in his deathbed.

Marianne smiled, she wished she could be there to see how the man died, but the woman knew that she didn’t want to be there when Parker discovered what she had done.

She thought of it silly that she was so worried about the boy and his reaction, but then she looked over at the hand he stabbed. Precaution never hurt anyone. Besides, she got everything she wanted from the Institution.

The woman would never forget Chainey. He was such a great specimen… if only she had more time with him.

But that was the past. And she needed to look to the future.

 

\---

 

“We’re here, PJ. Time to get out.” Noah called out as he parked his car in the institution, far from where Owen was being taken to. Parker immediately woke up, getting out of the car stretching as he did so and looking up to the sky; it was dawn.

 

“Well,” Noah said as he began to enter the building, slight bags under his eyes and with Parker on tow. “Time to prepare ourselves for the public announcement.”

“Are you going to show his face?”

“God no, did you see the kid? He would freak people out a lot. No,” Noah rubbed his eyes tired, but he seemed relieved as well. “We are going to search for a picture of him in the database, we can show that.”

Parker followed him silently, as everybody inside of the building frantically moved to make preparations.

“What will happen to him? Will you… kill him?” Parker had actually no idea what the Institution was going to do with Owen once they caught him. He always figured that they would execute him, but there were far more possibilities in terms of research. He shuddered while thinking of that, however.

“I… am not really sure at this point, to be completely honest with you.” Noah walked towards his office, trying to plan his next move. He would have to speak with Lazaro, which was most likely going to first tell him to go fuck himself and then explain what he wants him to do.

“I’m… I’m going to take a nap, okay?” Parker said with a meek voice as he crawled to the sofa right outside of Noah’s office. He had barely had any sleep in the past few days, he deserved the rest.

“It’s okay, PJ; I’ll wake you up before we do anything big.”

Parker nodded, as he curled up to himself in the leather couch; Noah entered his office to get ready for the next steps.

 

Sitting down in his desk, he grabbed his phone; first things first, he figured, as he called Lazaro waiting for the sick man to pick up.

“Noah.” The man on the other line answered. He didn’t seem angry like always, more like exhausted.

“Lazaro, Owen is here. What do you want me to do first?”

There was some silence at the other side of the line, as Noah waited patiently for Lazaro’s answer.

“Tell the media immediately that we have caught him. Then,” the man stopped to cough several times. “Research everything about that parasite. I want to know who he is, who his parents are if they are still alive- research everything about him. Prepare a press conference as soon as you can.”

He stopped to take a breath.

“I need to get ready,” more coughing. “…As for him, take him to Marianne immediately.” Noah bit his lip. “She knows what I want her to do.”

“Okay, Lazaro. I’ll call you when I have an official hour for the conference.”

“Thank you, Noah.” There was some silence from the man, Noah was about to hang up but Lazaro spoke once again. “Noah, I know you are all tired… but this is the final stretch. This is it, what we have worked for all these months.”

“I know, Lazaro. I’ll take some coffee, and I’ll let you know the hour of the press conference.”

“Good, good. See you there.”

 

Noah hanged up, sighing deeply as he passed his fingers through his hair. He dialed another number on his phone, putting the device on his ear as he waited for the other person to pick up.

“Yes, this is Noah. You will take Owen- the specimen to Marianne. If there is any trouble, tell me.”

He put his phone down once again, turning his computer screen on as he began researching about Owen Wright.

“This is the last stretch, Noah.” He repeated to himself as he kept typing on the keyboard. “This is what we have been worked for all these months…”

He sighed. It would be a long day.

 

\---

 

“Peej-“

Even if the voice hadn’t been too loud, it still woke parker up. The short teenager looked up to whoever called out for him, to find an embarrassed Bastian looking down at him.

“I didn’t know you were asleep- sorry I just-“

“It’s ok, Baz.” He sat straight, feeling even more rested now than before. “I was just catching some sleep.”

“Is it true?” Bastian’s voice was enthusiastic, Parker hadn’t seen him so happy ever since- ever since he was alive. “Was he caught? Owen? Did you catch Owen?”

Parker smiled, legitimately happy that he could finally say it. “Yes, we caught Owen.”

Bastian felt how a weight was lifted off from his shoulders, he could cry out of happiness now. He was so extremely happy everything ended; Parker couldn’t help but feel excited as well.

“Peej!” Bastian’s excited voice suddenly became horrified as he got closer to Parker, his fingers poking near the gaping hole the teenager had in the neck. “You need a doctor!”

“Oh, I forgot about that…” Parker chuckled but Bastian just became more horrified.

“How could you forget about that?!”

“Bastian, nothing hurts anymore, I lose track of my injuries fast.” He laughed, but he realized how Bastian became very quiet. “Look, I’m fine, really!”

“Well,” Bastian sat next to Parker on the couch, leaning his head back and reclining it on the couch. “At least you won’t have to worry about that anymore, right?”

“Heh,” Parker reclined his head back as well, feeling himself relaxed. “You are right.”

 

They stayed in that position in silence for a while, closing their eyes and falling in a not deep sleep.

_SLAM_

The sudden slam of the door that led to Noah’s office woke both of them up with a jump, Bastian almost falling from the couch as Parker stared at the door, which still vibrated.

The aware quickly jumped off the couch, pressing his ear to the wooden door. It wasn’t actually too hard to listen- whoever was inside was making a big scandal.

“…Marianne…” Parker eyes widened when he heard whoever was inside mention Marianne- he had completely forgotten about her. Did they send Owen to her? Was she going to do to Owen the same thing she did to him?

“Peej?” Bastian called out, but Parker didn’t listen, his entire attention set to the conversation inside.

“She’s gone. We can’t find her. None of her belongings are here. We’ve tried to contact her but her phone is off. She disappeared.”

Parker pressed ear to the door harder now, his cheek pressed as well as his hands now intrigued. Marianne was suddenly gone?

“What about her operation room? Did you look there?” He could barely hear Noah ask in a loud voice as well, it was obvious the man was starting to get as nervous as whoever was talking to him.

“It’s locked, we are trying to have someone open it, but there is blood seeping from it.”

 

Parker’s stomach dropped. His eyes went wide as he covered his mouth with his hand.

“Parker? What-“

The aware broke into a furious sprint, crashing against the walls and hallways, against doors until he came across the one he wanted- he wasn’t exactly sure how exactly he got there, only that one moment he was outside of Noah’s office and the next he was standing in front of Marianne’s operating room.

He looked down at his feet, his soles covered in blood.

People were staring at him- random workers, who seemed to be attempting to open the door.

 

Parker didn’t recall breaking down the door. He must have done so, because it laid a mess of splinters and broken parts, and his hand was bleeding with bone showing from the splinters and sharp parts of the door, the white of it being covered with his blood.

He stepped inside and it smelled of blood.

 

Parker found himself once again strapped to that table, feeling Marianne’s long fingers, digging inside of him, her eyes staring as she searched, scraped, touched,

Touched touched touched touched

She kept touching inside she kept digging inside she kept she kept she kept digging inside she kept touching she kept pulling and scratching and touching touching touching touching touching pulling him and showing him to himself his lungs his heart his liver his stomach everything in a table in a cold table and _she would not stop touching._

 

It wasn’t him. It was Chainey.

It was Chainey.

 _It was Chainey_.

 

He didn’t realize he was vomiting on the floor, that he had scratched at the white tiles until his fingernails broke off, that there were people staring at him from afar terrified of coming near as he screamed until he became hoarse. That he had ripped apart the stitches that she had left as a reminder of what she had done.

 

He was staring at the ceiling from the floor, the pink floral patterns accompanying him until he fully lost consciousness.

 

\---

 

Bastian shifted uncomfortable at the desk, the place was immaculate and well decorated and the chair was very comfortable, yet the teenager still felt very small in the room.

“As far as things go, the information you gave us was essential to capturing the killer, so we thank you a lot for that.” Noah was sitting at the other side of the desk, dark bags under his eyes.

“We apologize for having to contain you here, but I hope you do understand it was for your own good. Now that Sovereign City is safe, you will be able to leave soon. Unfortunately, you’ll have to wait until the press conference is over. It will be this afternoon, so don’t worry.

“It’s okay…” Bastian replied.

“You seem uneasy, is something wrong?” Noah asked with legitimate concern. Even if the man was incredibly tired, he still could feel there was something bothering Bastian.

“Parker Jones… he w-is my friend.” Bastian quickly corrected himself. “What will happen to him?”

It didn’t take long for Noah to reply.

“Mister Jones will be kept within the Institution to research everything related to him, in hopes that we can find a cure to his affliction and to the undead problem.”

“What about his family?”

Noah stayed silent for a moment.

“Unfortunately, we cannot tell his family about his current situation.”

“Why not? I think they deserve to know.”

“Frankly, Mister Nightingale,” Bastian leaned close to the desk. “None of this is your business. If there isn’t anything else I can help you with, I ask you to please leave. I am currently extremely busy.”

Bastian stared at the man, negating with his head slowly.

“Good. Farewell, Mister Nightingale.”

Bastian silently stood up, leaving the room in silence as Noah returned to organizing everything necessary for the press conference. That is, until some minutes later Lazaro came in the room slamming the door, wearing his bed clothes as he struggled to walk over Noah’s desk.

 

“Good morning, Lazaro.” Noah said calmly as he anticipated Lazaro’s ourtburst.

“Where is she?!” He screamed at Noah.

“We don’t know. She left the premises several hours ago, before we even brought Owen in.” Noah stopped typing on his computer to stare at Lazaro. “I have people searching for her, but she left no trace. She picked up all her things and simply left- she isn’t even at her apartment, there is no one there.”

Lazaro huffed in exasperation, his entire body shaking though Noah couldn’t tell if it was due to rage or due to sickness. Probably both.

“Anthony Chainey was tied up in her operating room, however; seems like she pulled the same thing she did with Parker Jones.”

“I know. I gave her authorization.”

 

Noah eyes widened as he stared at Lazaro.

“Don’t look at me like that, it was a necessary measure.”

“Necessary for what, Lazaro? You knew we were going to catch Owen, why did you-“

“Noah, shut the fuck up.” His nose began to bleed, but Lazaro didn’t care anymore.

“Well, we are trying to find her, but Marianne is good at hiding. I don’t think it will be easy to find her.”

“I don’t care,” Lazaro said as he whipped the blood off his nose with his hand. “We have more researchers. They will get what we want.”

“Should we give up searching for her, then?”

Lazaro thought for a moment, not exactly sure how to proceed.

“No, not for now. Keep Owen in observation, but don’t do anything to him. Not yet.” Lazaro began to exit the room as more blood leaked from his nose and mouth.

“The press Conference will be at one p.m.,” Noah spoke. “Do you think you will be up to it?”

“If I can’t, I’ll let you know.”

“We can’t have you bleed out in live television, Lazaro. It won’t be good for our popularity.”

Lazaro replied by slamming the door shut as he excited the room; Noah covered his face with his hands as he felt a knot build in his stomach.

He never expected any of this to happen, but he needed to power through.

He had the feeling that Owen wasn’t going to be the least of his problems.

 

\---

 

The feeling of fingers going through his hair jolted him awake with a scream, Samantha jumping off her chair to calm Parker down as he became aware of his surroundings.

Panting, the teenager stared at Samantha who seemed incredibly worried, but he still couldn’t understand what was happening.

“What… w-where-“

“Its okay PJ, you’ll be okay.”

“But- where am I?”

“You’re in the Institution infirmary.”

Infirmary? That’s new, normally infirmaries were for alive people.

“What-“

Parker suddenly remembered everything that had happened, what Marianne had done to him and Chainey, and the memory brought tears to his eyes, tears he couldn’t control.

“It’ll be okay, Peej, don’t worry.”

“W-where… where is….”

“Marianne is gone. She left just after what she did. Nobody can find her.”

Parker couldn’t give a shit about Marianne, he didn’t care about her. What he really wanted to know was what happened to Chainey.

“No- Chainey. Chainey, where is he? Where-“

“He’s in another room. He… He’s being cleaned up.”

Parker passed his fingers through his hair nervously. “Cleaned up? What- is he okay? Is he- Oh, god. Oh god this is my fault.”

“Parker, this isn’t your fault at all, you just-“

“No, you don’t understand. I-I refused to tell him why he shouldn’t trust them. I never- He got mad, and I never- If I had told him-“

He covered his mouth with his hand, sobbing quietly as every feeling caught up to him.

“Parker, this isn’t your fault. It’s Marianne’s fault, she was the one that did this to you. You… You aren’t to blame at all.”

“Can I see him?”

“I’m sorry, Parker. Not yet… maybe later. But not yet.”

Parker continued to sob curled to himself as the scar of his chest burnt with great intensity.

 

\---

 

“Good afternoon, I’m so glad you’ve managed to come this quickly, we thank you and we apologize for any inconvenience we may have caused.” Noah said to the microphone in front of him. To his left, the chair was empty, the chair that Lazaro was supposed to be occupying.

 

“Scarlett Cobbs, from Sovereign Daily. Where is Lazaro Palmer?” asked the blonde reporter from the front row.

“Unfortunately, due to health issues Mister Palmer is not available at the moment, however I will gladly answer any questions you may have about the situation.”

So far so good, Noah thought.

“You claimed this morning that you caught the Sovereign killer, is this true?” asked the same reporter. Noah wasn’t sure if he was going to like her or not.

“Yes, this is true. We have caught the Sovereign city killer today, 4 am in the morning. The identity of the Sovereign city Killer is that of Owen Wright,”

Before he could say anything else, a hurricane of questions was thrown at him, he couldn’t even understand any of them.

 

Parker walked through the hallways of the infirmary, his fingers touching the tiles of the walls as he walked- it kept him tied to his reality. He stepped outside of one of the doors, slightly opening it peeking inside.

Chainey was peacefully (or at least it looked like it) sleeping in the bed, his chest rising up and down. The teenager wanted to approach him, but Parker let him rest for the moment. He had been there, and he knew Chainey needed the sleep.

He closed the door silently, as he walked through the hallways of the institution, dead quiet as they all paid attention to the press conference, his steps were clumsy like a child that just learned how to walk, occasionally crashing silently against the walls he was walking along with.

 

“Before any questions are made, I will make some things clear. The killer, Owen Wright, has been researched and he is not a native of Sovereign City. More research is being made as for now.”

The reporters whispered among themselves, writing down things on their notepads.

“It has been confirmed that the killer is part of the undead, or as we call them in the Institution, one of the Aware.”

 

Lazaro passed his fingers through the smooth vial with the serum inside, his eyes focused on the liquid. Marianne had left him several of those with him, product of Chainey’s vivisection.

He looked up, his daughter still chained up to the bed, fast asleep.

His hands began to shake as he felt blood pour from his ears, nose and mouth once again, accidentally dropping the vial into the ground.

Lazaro immediately scrambled to the ground, trying to save the liquid spilled on the floor, stabbing himself with the shards of the glass that remained on the floor.

He looked at his shaking hands, the liquid on the floor, and the box full of vials with serum.

The man kneeled, his hands pressed against his face as his body began to shake as he sobbed.

 

“This Aware has been contained, and we will execute him immediately, we will bring justice to those he murdered. We will not leave the perpetrator unpunished.”

 

Parker stumbled upon the room, deep in the basement. Everything was excruciatingly white like a hospital, but there were no people around. He entered the room, barely aware of his own movements as he did so, the guards inside just staring at him cautiously but saying nothing- Parker didn’t even realize they were there as he walked up to the glass to the observation room.

 

“We as the Institution of the Undead care about the safety of the citizens of Sovereign City, and we will do everything we have in our power to protect the city.”

 

Parker pressed his forehead against the glass, staring at what was inside of the observation room.

Owen lay in the center, tied up to the table with many leather restraints keeping him in place, the table tilted so to observe Owen slightly better.

 

 

“Everything we do, we have the safety of this city and its citizens in mind.”

 

Owen opened his eyes, staring at Parker from the other side of the room.

He smiled.


	14. Claustrophobia

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He was so hungry.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Everybody Shatters.

Everything was disgustingly silent, the walls disgustingly pristine and there was a disgustingly clean smell in the entire room.

He hated it. He hated everything about it.  He wanted to get out of his binds and rip apart everything about that room, taint it with blood, leave scrapes on it-

But he couldn’t. He didn’t even try. He very well knew that even trying was ridiculous, stupid- a complete waste of time.

Owen didn’t even bother moving an inch, the smell of alcohol surrounding his nostrils as he stared to the white ceiling. There was absolutely nothing he wished more than to get away from there, to kill Lazaro himself and feast on his insides, but he lost. He knew he lost. He had tried his best to defeat the institution, to run from it but ultimately the worst had happened.

Owen shuddered when he imagined what they would do with him, the young undead was very aware of what happened to Parker-

 

His name lingered on his mind, echoing, as if Parker was the only thing that mattered now. Owen knew he should hate the boy- it was his fault he was there and was going to vivisected like a frog, but the Aware couldn’t help but feel…

Owen didn’t even know how the fuck he felt about Parker.

He supposed it didn’t matter now, considering his current situation.

 

Owen heard some soft footsteps around the room, prompting him to look at the glass directly across him, he was slightly surprised that Parker was there, staring.

He wanted to scream. He wanted to tell him to go fuck himself, that if he got out of his binds he would smash his skull against the concrete again and again, that he would hunt every single person he cared about in life and death and would butcher them until there were no more.

But one part of him was glad that he got to see the young man before they started whatever they would do with him.

He couldn’t help but smile at the absurdity of the situation.

 

He wanted to holler, to laugh hysterically at him, at Parker, at the institution- at everything, at the fact that now he was tied up about to be opened and poked around by people he hated; but he had no energy. The only thing that came out of his mouth was a chuckle as he felt his body ache with pain and hunger.

Would they feed him? Probably not. Maybe they would keep toying with him so he would change from feral to aware state. The idea made him chuckle again.

Parker simply stared silently, horrified (horrified? Owen couldn’t even tell at this point) but he said nothing. Owen reclined his head back, staring at the ceiling once again.

He was so hungry.

 

\---

 

Noah rubbed his face with his palms completely exhausted after having to answer so many questions from the press conference, every question more intricate than the other one. However, after some hours he was finally done with that, the man returning to his office as he was trying to figure out what do next.

As far as he knew, they still hadn’t found Marianne and they still had Owen tied up in the basement of the building- not only that, but he would have to deal with the fallout of Marianne actions with Parker. The man wasn’t looking forward to that.

For now, he would probably take a nap on his office. A nap sounded fine.

 

The first sign that something was obviously wrong was that he heard the wind inside of the room, even as he was standing in front of it.

He felt the bottom of his stomach go cold, as he opened it with resolve without even thinking that it might be dangerous to do so.

Noah’s office was practically ravaged, the windows leading to the outside broken with the glass lying on the floor, documents torn and throw into the ground, his plants destroyed as the dirt laid on the carpet of the office. His desk was broken, smashed into several pieces as the things that were once on it laid uselessly broken alongside it- his computer, his papers- everything was destroyed.

The window, he thought. It was the only way to enter the office without having to deal with security.

The man ran towards the window, hopelessly expecting that maybe he would caught sight of the criminals even if he was pretty sure who it probably was.

He leaned down, staring out of the window careful to not poke himself with the glass shards, but nothing- there were some grappling guns stuck to the side of the building. So that’s how they got in.

Noah sighed in desperation, turning around about to call security when he saw what was scribbled with crude red graffiti on the entrance of the office, the paint still dripping from the fresh words slashed across the room.

 

_THE REAPER CANNOT BE CONTAINED_

_WE WILL RETURN TO OUR ROOTS BELOW THE GROUND_

_YOUR INTERFERENCE WILL BE PUNISHED_

Noah immediately grabbed his cellphone, frantically pressing the buttons with shaky fingers while sweat rolled down his forehead, dialing the first number he could think of.

Before Lazaro could say anything, Noah pressed the phone near to his mouth, the device shaking in his hands.

“The cult,” Noah didn’t realize he was panting. “the cult is here.”

 

\---

 

Samantha knew very well that the cult was something you didn’t want to mess with. Apart from the fact that one of the rituals was to sacrifice your own flesh to it, they were nothing but a bunch of terrorists that revered the zombie uprising.

They smaller parts of the cult liked to harass people, vandalize things and generally be a nuisance; the larger part was the one that truly committed terrible acts. Robberies, killings, plain out terrorism when bombing places.

Samantha recalled that they bombed on of the shelters for survivors after Lazaro set up the wall.

It was terrifying.

 

They glorified the undead, and it seemed like they themselves wanted everybody to glorify it too, that they would do whatever needed to stop anything that could prevent more deaths from the zombie uprising.

When Owen had started his rampage through the city, they stopped. The graffiti and vandalism stayed, the walls of the city decorated with crude words about how The Sovereign City killer was the reaper, and he would bring justice to the earth.

Apart from that, they stayed quiet. Samantha never considered that maybe catching Owen would get them angry.

Her stomach churned.

 

Noah had frantically calling her after having called Lazaro, informing her of the situation and how it was very likely they were in danger. He sounded incredibly nervous- how couldn’t he be? His office was directly threatened. If anyone should be scared, it should be him, and yet hearing the normally so calm man panting through the other side of the phone deeply perturbed her.

They had planted bombs before, who was to say they didn’t do the same now?

About five minutes passed after Noah called her, Samantha was ordered to leave the building immediately by Noah, but the red haired woman made her way through the hallway trying to find her friends.

Parker had no idea of the situation, and his current emotional state was unpredictable. Chainey was still recuperating, she had no idea if they could take him out in time.

On time for what? That was the truly scary thing. It could be anything or nothing at all.

 

She opened the door to Chainey’s room even if she still had no idea what she was going to do. The teenaged Aware was still unconscious, Samantha didn’t even think the consequences when she went up and touched his hand.

Her fingers pressed slightly against his cold skin.

 

A flash of white.

Everything went horrifyingly white, her eyes full of white her ears full of white her mouth spilling the white as it spilled it spilled from her body, her mind becoming white as she felt everything so suddenly, so suddenly existing it was overwhelming, the sheer horror of everything being, of the entirety of things so deafening, everything everyone was white.

 

And then, nothing.

 

\---

 

Lazaro shifted on his bed as he dialed on the cellphone. Noah had just started the press conference, and there was absolutely nothing that Lazaro wanted more than just lay in bed and fall asleep until god knows when, but he had urgency.

He dialed the phone, it took him a while but he finally managed to get the number right, clutching the device between his boney palms.

“Hello?” the feminine voice said from the other side of the line, as if surprised someone had actually called her.

“Surgeon Cassandra Rod, is that correct?” Lazaro said in a raspy voice, the woman on the other side of the line gasping as she realized just who had called her.

“Yes sir- she’s speaking.” Her voice was shaky. She had never actually talked to Lazaro before.

“You are the next in line after Marianne, right?” He didn’t even bother saying her last name, everybody in the Institution knew who she was already.

“Ye-yes, of course sir.”

“Good. Congratulations, now you have her job.” Lazaro coughed harshly on the line, spitting some blood on the process.

“As your first duty, I want you to continue Marianne’s work on Owen Wright.”

The woman stuttered on the other side of the line.

“Sir, I- I don’t-“

“I have her formula. I have already arranged a vial to be sent down to the basement. Use it. I want you to create as much as you can from Owen.”

He could hear the woman shallow breathes as she tried to keep her composure.

“Take all the surgeons you can, the ones you think are the best- I don’t care. I just want you to start immediately, as in right this instant. Understood?”

Cassandra whispered a soft yes on the phone, barely audible. Lazaro cut the call, placing the cellphone on his stand.

 

His eyes traveled to the box full of serum on his desk; even if Marianne had straight up left, she still stuck to her side of the agreement and delivered him so much serum.

But it wasn’t enough.

Lazaro’s eyes now traveled to the door that led to his daughter’s room. The man didn’t even know if at this point he actually hoped to cure her, to revive her or if him keeping her alive was just to have something to truly hang on to.

He eyed the box of serum.

It would never be enough.

That’s why he authorized Marianne to operate on Chainey, because he knew no matter how much serum there is how many vials he gets it will never be enough.

He didn’t feel any guilt about Chainey. Why should he? He didn’t even know the kid. He didn’t care about him, at all, everything he cared about was the serum.

He would do anything to keep it safe.

Without realizing it, he fell asleep, but like most of his nights nowadays, he didn’t dream.

 

The frantic buzzing of his phone awoke him, the boney man reaching to grab it as his arms shook. God, he was pathetic, he couldn’t even reach for his phone.

He checked the caller, and it obviously was Noah. Lazaro glanced to the clock on the wall, the arms on the device marking it was about 4 o clock in the afternoon. Without knowing what to expect, he took the call.

Before Lazaro could say anything, Noah’s nervous voice broke through.

“The cult,” it was as if he was out of breath. “The cult is here.”

Lazaro remained unmoving, the phone on his ear as he processed the information.

“My office, they broke into my office and,” he could hear the sounds of Noah shifting uncomfortable, his cheek pressing into the phone and making sounds. “God Lazaro, they broke into my office! They’re mad we captured Owen! They could have planted a bomb for fuck sake!”

Lazaro remained silent, but he knew very well he had to say something soon.

“Noah,” his voice was calm, collected. He didn’t know what he was doing. “Is your office phone working?”

“No,” the man hesitated, as if he was making sure if the device worked or not.

“Leave the building immediately.” He was amazed at how calm and collected he was, himself. “I have an intercom in my room here, I will call everybody to leave immediately.”

“What about you?”

“I’ll call people to come here,” Lazaro coughed, trying to rush his words eager to start escaping the place. “Now, go!”

He didn’t eve wait for Noah to cut the line, he cut it himself as he got up to utilize the intercom- even if the threat was false, he couldn’t risk it, he couldn’t afford to-

 

Lazaro eyes shot up to the vials on his desk.

He stood there, as if he was waiting for them to say something. He even expected himself to do something but the man could only stare at the vials as if they were alien.

The man mind jumped to the basement, where Cassandra and her surgeons were currently operating on Owen.

He stared at his daughter’s room.

 

They couldn’t know. No one could know. He would lose everything, and he would lose her.

It was just a threat.

They just did it to scare them off.

There was no risk.

Lazaro opened the door to his daughter’s room, the chained girl still unconscious chained against the wall.

He sat on her bed, as he began to caress her hair slowly as she kept unconscious, the man tracing his fingers across her green skin.

 

White hot energy traveled across his body, doing and undoing him as everything stopped being. His fingers plastered on her skin as everything was hot and unmoving, and yet cold and unstoppable at the same time, the sound of the serum vials bursting open and shattering as their contents spilled across the room as the room itself became undone, leaving Lazaro with nothing but the realization of everything he had done.

 

And yet it would never be enough.

 

\---

 

He felt exhausted, even if he hadn’t actually done anything all day. Bastian had awoken pretty early when he heard Owen was captured and had been a rollercoaster of emotions the entire day, the fact that the nightmare was over and he would never have to worry about Owen harassing him lifted a huge weight on his shoulders.

It was slightly overwhelming.

Noah told him that he needed to wait for the press conference to be done with so he could leave, but he was also told that he needed to wait until someone told him he had actual permission to leave.

It didn’t matter, he was so excited he could leave he didn’t mind having to wait a little longer.

 

“Bastian Nightingale?” a young man opened the door to his room, Bastian eagerly stood up.

“Yes, that’s me.”

“Okay,” the man straightened himself as if he tried to remember exactly what he was supposed to say. “I was sent here to tell you that you are free to leave the Institution premises whenever you are ready.”

Bastian smiled brightly, he could hug the man right there right now. He didn’t, however.

“Thanks a lot!” He said, the man giving a small nod as he closed the door and left the teenager alone on his room.

The teen already had everything ready to leave, as he picked up the small backpack he had and opened the door. He was so eager to leave, he suddenly remembered Parker.

Bastian figured he should say something, talk about when they would see each other again. After all, Bastian wasn’t too keen on losing his friend once again.

He had no idea where to look, however.

The teenager spotted one of the workers walking across the hallway, pulling them over gently to ask about his whereabouts.

“Um, I’m not really sure,” the woman said as she bit her lip trying to think an answer. “He is probably around the infirmary. I don’t think you are allowed to get there, though.”

“Please, I’m his friend, I just want to talk to him.”

“I’m sorry, I-“

“I just,” Bastian realized all of sudden how rude he was by interrupting the girl, but he still kept speaking. “I just really need to talk to him, please. It’s really important-“

 

A loud crash was heard- no, a loud crash was felt across his body as he saw debris fly in every direction, time slowing down but him not able to do anything at all, just watching how everything became undone around them.

He realized he was on the ground, the woman having thrown herself on top of him to protect him from whatever was happening, the debris flying across the air as his ears rumbled from the sheer intensity of the sound.

The woman said something. He couldn’t tell what it was, he was too busy losing consciousness while the world kept shaking around him.

 

\---

 

The brunette aware walked through the hallways, having to remind himself every minute what he was doing.

Parker was going to speak with Lazaro. He figured he would speak about Marianne. Probably. He didn’t even know if he was going the right way, but he kept walking.

His mind was foggy and hazy, barely aware of his movements as he clumsily walked through them.

Parker felt as if he was watching himself from far away, as if his movements were automatic. He couldn’t figure out what to do, he only thought that maybe he should talk with Lazaro, he didn’t even know about what.

It slightly bothered him that he couldn’t even remember why he was so upset about.

He knew he needed an edge, he knew he needed something to remind him and to bring him back to reality, something that told him he needed to snap out of whatever trance he was in- but for now, he was too tired. Too tired and too confused to do anything at all.

 

The teenager felt the crash, the boom- whatever sound it was, he felt it. He felt the ground rumble below him, above him- at his sides, everything shaking and rumbling as Parker tried to understand what happened, until a shock wave shoved him into the ground.

He heard screaming, more strange sounds he probably should have identified, but it was too much. Too much for him.

It was so much it suddenly was nothing at all.

 

\---

 

Davey tapped his fingers on the counter of the reception, the receptionist awkwardly staring down at him not exactly sure how to get him to calm down.

“Listen, I’m sorry, but I already told you- you can’t pass!” the receptionist tried her hardest to remain calm, but Davey was pulling on her nerves. “You will have to wait for your friend to leave through here!”

“Then, where can we wait for him?” Davey said slightly frustrated that he wasn’t allowed to get in and retrieve his friend personally.

“Please sir, you and your friend wait on the lounge,” she pointed to some couches near the desk slightly happy that she managed to get Davey to leave.

Davey grumpily sat down one of the couches, Micah following and sitting next to him with arms crossed, checking things on his phone.

 

Due to Bastian parents having a family emergency (his aunt having a heart attack scare, to be exact), his parents requested Davey to please pick him up to accompany him home. Davey agreed immediately, and managed to get Micah to tag along to finally see their friend.

“This is ridiculous, the press conference ended a while ago. Where is he?” Davey said nervously. In reality, he was just eager to see Bastian, and every second that passed him made him more and more nervous.

He could tell Micah was nervous as well, with his fidgeting with his phone staring at nothing in particular and his demeanor.

“I’m just glad all of this is over,” Micah said as he continued to pretend to be busy with the phone. “Shit was too creepy.”

“Yeah…” Davey sighed, shifting on his seat as he stared through the door where Bastian was supposed to come from.

He felt something in his stomach, some sort of uneasiness, as if something very bad was going to happen.

Davey ignored the feeling, instead staring up at the television set in the lounge as it was repeating the press conference held earlier that afternoon.

They stayed in silence for a while, waiting for Bastian to arrive as they both distracted themselves, Micah with his phone, Davey with the television broadcasting.

 

“I hope he’s okay.”

Micah suddenly speaking surprised him, he blinked and stared silently at the younger teen who was still holding his phone, but staring at it emptily.

“Yeah?”

“You know, all of this. We can’t pretend nothing happened.”

Davey scratched his head- Micah was right. They couldn’t just pretend nothing had happened, not after all this time. With them being attacked, Micah almost dying, Bastian being hunted by the killer…

Parker dying…

 

They couldn’t pretend nothing had happened, and that pained him. He only wanted everything to go back to normal, but that wasn’t going to be possible.

“You know,” Davey said as Micah raised his head, looking at the brunette.

“I never asked you, how you felt.” He fidgeted with his hands having a slight hard time explaining his feelings. “After the attack. After that creep-“

He couldn’t bring himself to end the sentence, terror seeping through his stomach as he did so.

Micah shifted uncomfortable, as if the memories from that night rushed into him in one hit.

“It’s- I don’t know.” He said, burying his face on his hands. “I don’t know, Davey. I don’t know. I mean, I-“

The teen began to silently sob, and Davey felt bad for reminding him of the incident.

Davey shakily extended his hand, not sure if he should pat Micah or not.

“Micah, I-“

 

A loud boom shook the entire building, overloading every single one of his senses as he couldn’t understand what was happening- and yet, Davey knew something terrible and horrifying was going on.

His first instinct was to throw himself to Micah, shielding the smaller teen with his body as everything passed, finally understanding that there had been an explosion somewhere in the building.

Davey’s head buzzed, feeling the dirt falling onto him as alarms were set off, screams resonated and debris fell.

The teenager had no idea how much time had actually passed until it stopped, lifting his shaking body from Micah, horror seeping into his stomach when he realized that he hadn’t felt Micah move through the entire ordeal.

Eyeing him down, he realized Micah was breathing- just unconscious.

He sighed in relief, as he hazily stood up trying to make out what had happened.

 

There was an explosion. They survived. There was an explosion inside of the building and they survived.

He looked to the receptionist desk but there was no one there, the girl probably ran off after the ordeal was over, or was still hiding. Davey coughed a handful of dirt, his legs shaking as he took some steps.

The bitter realization that Bastian was still inside the building hit him like a truck.

 

Without thinking, he sprinted past the desk venturing inside the building, with nothing but determination on his mind.

 

\---

 

“Okay, Okay… Um,” Cassandra stared at the vial, at the surgeons next to her and to the teenager strapped on the table.

“Okay. Let’s- let’s open him up first, okay? We will work our way from there.”

 

Owen did nothing but silently stare at the woman and the other surgeons surrounding him, all of them looking terrified out of their wits. He had expected to see the woman that tried to catch him among them, but she was absent for some reason.

“Cassandra, we can’t do this. Marianne is the only one that knows how to-“

“I know, I know!” The short blonde woman said as she bit her finger nervously.

“But, she’s gone and Lazaro wants us to do it.” She left a slightly red mark on her finger. “So we need to do this, and now.”

Ah, so that’s why she wasn’t there.

They all shifted uncomfortably as they weren’t sure what to exactly do, Owen felt fingers starting to lift off his shirt to start cutting up- he bit his lip blood spilling from it as he closed his eyes, awaiting for it to start.

 

He felt the knife beginning to slice his skin, hissing as the cold tip formed patterns on his skin.

 

A loud boom along with shaking stopped the surgeons from their work, dropping their knives as they all crouched in fear, the entire building shaking violently as terrible sounds could be heard. Dirt fell from the ceiling as the ground continued to shake for several seconds.

Owen just stared to the ceiling, motionless and thoughtless. He didn’t care. As long as he knew he could die crushed right there right now and he wouldn’t care.

And as sudden as it started, it was over, the surgeons standing upright trying to collect themselves as they tried to figure out what to do now.

“What what what happened?!” one of the tallest ones said.

“Was that an explosion?!”

“Cassandra, what do we do?!” one of the other surgeons, a balding man, practically shouted at the woman.

“I don’t know!” she clutched at her head, terrified out of her wits. “Lazaro will kill me! What do we do, I just- God!”

 

The door to the room burst open, someone kicking it harshly and entering it, the surgeons all turned around to see the strange figures clad in black- they were not part of the Institution.

“What in the name of-“ Before the balding surgeon could say anything else, one of the figures shot him in the head, his insides splattering all over his coworkers.

Before the surgeons had any chance of screaming, the rest of the figures opening fire into the rest of the people in there.

Owen didn’t bother moving, he only stared at the ceiling as blood splattered all over him, alarms being set off upstairs.

He felt one of the figures approach him, using the knife to open his binds.

Eventually, after some minutes Owen was free.

 

He sat up straight and stared at the dead surgeons on the floor, every single one of them bleeding from everywhere, unmoving.

His eyes silently shot to the one that had liberated them.

“We… we came here for you,” said the one that had freed him. Owen realized he had scars on his face, missed an eye… he examined the rest of the persons in the room, all of them missing a limb or two, scars adorning them. Owen wasn’t stupid, he knew who these people where.

He remained silent as he stared at them.

“We believe you are doing great things for the earth,” he continued speaking, Owen realized that the shakiness of his voice was more of excitement rather than fear. “it’s not fair what they were going to do to you. We, We believe in what you do.”

Owen stared at the man in the eyes.

“We think we can help you, We believe-“

 

His words were cut short when Owen jumped to the man, chewing his face off as the people screamed and started to shoot at him to no avail.

 

He was so hungry.


	15. Euphoria

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Davey couldn’t understand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> He just wants to understand.

“We have reports that a bomb has gone off in the building minutes ago, we do not know the cause of the incident, the death toll unknown. We have no communication to the inside of the building, the authorities have already gathered-“

Marianne turned off the radio as she kept driving, not turning back.

She heard an explosion earlier, but the woman never would have guessed that it originated from the Institution.

After several minutes of drawing she finally reached her destination, pulling over outside of the small innocuous house pretty far away from the Institution. Turning off the engine of her car, she gripped the wheel tightly, the corners of her mouth twitching.

Death toll unknown, huh? Lazaro and Parker could be dead for everything she knew, and that certainly made things easier. She wouldn’t have to worry about them searching for her anymore.

Lazaro was definitely dead, she believed, there was no way he would have survived the explosion. Having realized this, she got out of the car and grabbed her handbag fishing for the keys inside of it until she grabbed them, opening the door and closing it right after she entered the house. The house was decorated but not too extravagantly, it was pretty simple in fact and Marianne made a mental note to change decorations as soon as she could. Even so, she sat down on the couch, a small cloud of dust appearing as she did so, the woman grimaced at the dust.

 

Marianne had to admit to herself that she was slightly surprised at the new turn of events, she didn’t expect something so extreme to happen, at least not so soon. At least she got out of there before it happened, otherwise she would probably be part of the death toll by now.

She sighed, getting up from the couch as she checked the fridge- empty.

Marianne grimaced, cookies would have to wait.

 

\---

“Can you hear me? Do you understand what I am saying?”

Micah opened his eyes slowly, feeling pretty strange in the process- he was moving, but he wasn’t doing the moving himself. Wrinkling his nose, he realized he was being taken in a gurney to somewhere- probably to an ambulance.

“I’m okay,” he quickly said as he started to slowly wave his hands around, as if to prove that he was in fact okay. “I’m okay, I’m okay…” he repeated.

“We still need to take you to the hospital and make sure you are really okay.” The paramedic said as they continued to rush him to the ambulance.

How annoying, another trip to the goddamned hospital. Micah groaned as he realized something very important.

“Wait! Where is Davey, where is he?!” Micah suddenly sat up in the gurney, being gently put down by the paramedic as they loaded him in the ambulance. Micah paid attention to his surroundings, police officers and ambulance started to arrive at the scene by the minute, Micah glanced up as he saw there was fire escaping the building, the smoke filling the afternoon sky.

“Where is Davey?!” he repeated, trying once again to get off the gurney but being stopped by the paramedic.

“What does he look like? We will search for him,” said the man as he tried to not alarm Micah, but the fact was still there: when he was picked up, he was alone.

“He- he was with me when the explosion happened,” Micah quickly said, almost stuttering. “He is taller than me, he’s sixteen, brown hair, blue eyes, he uh, he wore a red hoodie…”

Micah began to panic. He knew very well that Davey was the kind of person to rush in to help, but he was terrified that something would happen to him. The fool.

“Please… please find him.”

“We will,” the paramedic closed the door, leaving the boy inside with other two persons he didn’t know but assumed were paramedics as well, leaving him with only that promise.

They had to find him.

 

\---

 

The smell of something burning was the first thing that brought him back to reality; the sound of sirens reaching his ears as he struggled to move, scared that if he did so he would shatter.

Parker gasped softly as he realized what had caused the destruction around him.

His eyes adjusted to the darkness as he made out the debris and the rubble- the hallway had collapsed, not completely but it still was very ruined. Still shaking, the teen stood up with some difficulty as he noticed how weak his legs were.

An explosion, he realized as he leaned on the wall trying not to fall, the sirens strong in the background and alarms inside of the building ringing.

It was still hard for him to fully understand what happened, stumbling across the hallway as he tried to find some exit, shouts reached his ears but he couldn’t understand what they were saying.

People were trapped inside.

 

The realization crashed through him violently, sheer terror and horror crawling up to him as he finally realized what happened and that he needed to help.

There was an explosion inside of the building, and he needed to do something to help the people that were trapped inside. How many got out? Was he the only one inside?

Parker stopped thinking so much about it, sprinting towards the nearest sound he heard- some screams.

 

\---

 

Harsh coughing woke him up, until he realized he was the one that was coughing.

Bastian realized he was lying with his belly on the floor, his cheek pressed against the cold floor as he coughed dust off himself. His ribcage hurt when he breathed, as if something was pressing his chest.

“Ugh, what-“ The teenager tried to move but he couldn’t feel his legs- he tried to crawl or move but he felt something pressing against his lower half, whatever it was it didn’t let him feel his legs, he tried to move his toes but he couldn’t.

“Oh god, oh god-“ Bastian began to panic as he started to pant, clawing at the ground as he tries his best to claw himself out of there, but no matter how much he clawed he didn’t move at all.

“Don’t move! Don’t move!” he recognized the voice of the woman he previously was talking with before the explosion happened.

“What happened, I can’t feel my legs, why can’t I move?!” he began to hyperventilate, panting harshly as he kept trying to get out of whatever was making him stuck against the floor.

“Your legs are trapped in rubble, but its okay. Its okay, your legs are okay. You are just trapped, that’s it.” She tried her hardest to calm him down.

Okay? How could it possibly be okay? They were trapped there, just after an explosion had happened. What if they never were found? What if the ceiling gave up on them? There were too many things that could go so wrong it made Bastian sick of even thinking about it.

“Don’t worry, I hear sirens! They are coming for us, don’t worry. It’ll be okay.”

Bastian remained silent, trying to get himself relaxed and breathing slower, but he could feel himself sweat from the terror.

“You’re the kid that was held here for a while, right?” The woman asked, trying her hardest to distract the teenager and calm him down.  “What is your name?”

“Bastian,” he was breathing slower but he still felt agitated. “Bastian Nightingale.”

“Hello, my name is Robin Canner.” She replied back. “Don’t worry, everything will be alright.”

Bastian laid his face down against on the ground, trying his hardest to not sob. He would have to believe her, since there was nothing else he could do.

 

He had to believe her.

 

\---

 

Chainey woke up way too suddenly, his last memory being awake on the operating table as Marianne dug on him, the feeling of those long fingers poking and pulling inside of him as she cooed and gave him pet names- it was too much, it was way too overwhelming for him.

But now everything was dark, the smell of tea and cookies mixed with his own blood replaced by the smell of dust and smoke, the operating table he was in replaced by the harsh floor- he fell from his bed, or more like the bed tipped over with him on it.

The teenager panicked, scrambling himself trying to stand up but only slipping and falling on his own feet, his throat trying to form coherent words but he could only whimper and sob as he tried to stand up. He felt his insides touch each other, now painfully aware of them and how they felt as he moved, scrapping against each other, touching-it was revolting.

“Shhh, shhh it’s okay,” A soft female voice said. At first, Chainey panicked more thinking that it was Marianne’s voice, but after some seconds he recognized it as Samantha’s voice. “It will be okay, Chainey, you are safe.”

Safe from what? He didn’t seem very safe in that small cave, with the smell of smoke lingering in the air.

“What happened, Samantha- where are you?!” he extended his hands in the darkness, but before he could spot anything he felt Samantha lightly pat him, calming him down a little.

“I’m here Chainey, I’m here, it’s me, Sam.” The woman reassured, crawling to where he was as she lightly hugged him, making sure Chainey didn’t feel attacked or uncomfortable by it. Her warm hands were dirty, covered in dirt and dust as well as blood- he wondered if it was hers. Probably so. He couldn’t help but squeeze her hand harshly in worry, he felt guilty of doing so afterwards.

“Sam, she- she…”

“I know, Chainey. I know. I’m so sorry.”

“I… Oh, god. That’s- this is why. This is why Parker didn’t want me to be around the institution,” his voice was shaking, at the verge of tears. “she did this to him too, didn’t she?”

“…yes.” Samantha replied sadly, still hugging into the tall aware, not even sure if it was to comfort him or comfort herself.

It wasn’t until that moment that Chainey realized just how different Samantha felt. Normally she was so warm, she was so… different, but something about her changed and he could feel it in some kind of level, feeling it like he felt his organs grinding together inside of him.

“Sam?” he asked, but Samantha didn’t reply, as if she was holding her breath trying to not cry, to not make a sound. “Samantha, what happened? What is going on?”

 

“There was an explosion,” she replied, not letting go of him. The smell of smoke got closer to them, stronger, but Chainey didn’t pay attention to that yet. Only to Samantha’s small frame pressed against him.

His eyes adjusted to the darkness finally, ignoring the feeling of his guts as he tried to figure out what had happened, his yes fully scanning Samantha with difficulty- it was still dark, after all.

She was hugging him with her left arm, her right arm covered in blood and lying limply on her side- she didn’t seem to make any effort to move it. Her face was covered in scrapes and blood, her hair redder than normal and her right ear sprouting blood.

Her entire right side seemed heavily damaged, her stomach showing with scrapes, bruises and some burns. Chainey felt horrified at her state and at the fact that he hadn’t realized that the woman was very hurt.

“Sam, Oh my God, Sam!”

“I’m okay,” she smiled but it hurt too much, simply reclining against Chainey. “I’m okay, I can move my feet, I think. My arm hurts too much, though…”

“Sam, I need to get you out of here,” he attempted to stand up, feeling his organs scrape bruise touch dig dig dig-

He stopped, sliding against the wall as he remained in his seated position.

“Sam, I’m so sorry, I-“

“Don’t worry Chainey, it’ll be okay.” He noticed tears began to spill from her eyes, but he didn’t say anything.

The smell of smoke became stronger now.

“I think,” she said, gasping for air as she tried to not cry too loud. “There’s a fire near us.”

 

Chainey remained silent, as he gently rubbed his fingers on Samantha’s bloody palm.

 

\---

 

“Sir, if could you just-“

“There are still people inside! There are several persons inside! All my staff, you need to get them out of there!”

Noah’s hair was messy, full of dust and sweat- his suit was in the same shape, his expensive jacket having been lost at some point, he didn’t care. His white shirt was smudged with ash and dirt, his tie messy and out of place. He also didn’t care.

The moment he had called Lazaro, Noah practically sprinted downstairs as he called Samantha. He felt the explosion take place but he was not near the actual explosion- miraculously (and after running for god knows how much time) he had managed to actually exit the building. With his adrenaline, the man reached the police officers that were already gathering to scream at them that they needed to get everybody out of the building.

“You need to get all of them out! It was the cult, the cult threatened us! They did this! They painted graffiti in my office, I know they did this!” he was running out of breath, but he was panicking. Why did any of these men rushed inside? They needed to help.

“Sir, our team is already doing their best, we cannot simply rush in- we have no idea if the building can collapse or if there are any more bombs-“

“There are people inside!”

The adrenaline rush began to run out, as he felt sudden exhaustion.

“Sir, we need to take you to a hospital-“

“No, I need you to get everybody out of there! there are children inside!”

Well, dead children, but his point still stood.

 

The small fire that was coming out of one of the building floors suddenly grew intense, a ball of fire spitting from the building and into the sky as everybody stared in horror.

The firefighters were getting into the scene, but Noah just wanted them to do something more about it apart from sitting there and just staring.

“Sir, how many people were inside?”

“I don’t know- all of our workers! Our researchers! Our interns! Lazaro Palmer was inside of the building, for crying out loud!”

This last fact made the police officer blink in surprise, not exactly sure if he should do or say anything. He called via his radio to someone, as Noah stared in anger at the man.

“Yeah, this man here- it’s the one that was on the press conference this afternoon. The Asian guy. Yeah, he says Lazaro Palmer is inside of the building.”

He stood silent for a moment, then turned his radio off as he commanded the rest of the officers, and motioned to the firefighters that had just gotten there as well.

“Listen, we need to get everybody out there now! Lazaro Palmer is inside! He is our priority!”

 

Noah would have laughed hysterically, but he was far too furious to do so. Is that how it was? They didn’t care about anything, but suddenly they learn Lazaro is in the building and no they need to save everybody inside as soon as possible? Noah wanted to punch the officer, but his body was too out of energy.

At least he saw everybody getting to work, as someone tried to lead him away to an ambulance.

“Sir, you need medical attention-“

“No, I need to make sure everybody gets out. I am fine.”

“Sir, there’s blood coming from your head.”

Noah passed his fingers through his hair, and sure enough he felt a hot wet spot on his head, blood pouring from it. He hadn’t realized it until now, he stared at the blood on his fingers as he suddenly realized that this blood dripped to his face as well. He also couldn’t lie but, he was starting to feel very dizzy.

“Sir? Sir, look at me.” The paramedic words were like white noise to him, Noah felt how everything looked… strange, static, as if everything as foreign and he was watching everything from a glass.

“Sir!”

His legs gave up harshly, falling to the ground with paramedics rushing to him trying to stop his fall. His ears were slightly bleedings, he found out later.

“Sir, we need to take you to the hospital.” Now their words were clearer, but everything still seemed strangely unreal.

“No, this is ridiculous,” he whined as people were dragging him to the ambulance, he tried to fight them but it was useless- Noah’s had no command of his limbs as they kept dragging him away. “I am perfectly fine, I need to be here!”

“Sir, you are injured! We will take you to the hospital!” one of the paramedics yelled.

“I need to stay here!” He cried out, as they laid him down on a gurney. “I need to make sure they get everybody out! They need to get them out! There are people in there!”

He had no more energy to shout as the ambulance carried him away.

 

\---

 

Davey ran across the hallways of the building along people that were rushing to the opposite direction, some injured and covered in blood and others that seemed to just be scared. It seemed like in their rush and their horror they didn’t pay attention to the teenager running _inside_ the building.

“Excuse me- have you seen Bastian? A teen-“

“No!”

No matter who he asked, it seemed that no one had seen him, and they weren’t too eager to actually go and search for him. This was stupid, Davey thought, there were so many rooms, so many floors- it was impossible for him alone to find him, not to mention incredibly dangerous. He had rushed without a thought, but now he was too deep in this own mess for him to back out for now.

“Bastian! Bastian!” He yelled to the empty hallways, the fire alarms in the building ringing off uncontrollably as he made his way through the rooms, bursting every single one of them open but there was no sight of his friend.

This was taking way too long, there was no way he would be able to find him in time.

“This was stupid,” he thought to himself as he ran in no specific direction, even if he didn’t know what to do he wasn’t the person to stop and think about what to do next. “This was very stupid!”

 

He could hear sirens outside of the building; that at least made him feel better knowing that people were already there to help. Davey still needed to find Bastian, however, and he still was lost in the massive building, the smell of smoke reaching his nostrils- this was bad.

 

“…thank god…”

Davey felt himself freezing when he heard the very faint mumbling, his eyes shooting around trying to find just where that voice came from.

He needed to climb up, he knew he needed to go to the next floor. Hurrying, he made his way to the next floor of the building, the smell of smoke and the general chaos being more apparent than in the previous buildings.

Debris, smoke, dirt flying around- the hallway was a mess as several rooms were caved in, it didn’t seem to be the epicenter of the bomb and yet it was so damaged, Davey needed to act fast or he wouldn’t be able to actually find the owner of the voice in time. He didn’t even know if it was Bastian, but he knew he needed to help.

 

Davey rushed towards where he thought he heard the voice, a part of the hallway that had been caved in but seemed to have been recently opened by someone (someone? The debris was far too heavy to just be cleared out like that), leaving a small opening to the cave-in.

“Hello?! Is anybody there?!” Davey called as he carefully peeked through the hole, but he couldn’t see anything- before awaiting for a reply, he pulled his phone out as he activated it, using the light from the smartphone as a small lantern.

The teenager dropped his cellphone as he saw the contents of the cave in, the screen of the device shattering as the light went out.

 

\---

 

The smell of smoke got stronger by the minute, and yet Samantha still felt cold, even if she was wrapped around Chainey. Well, he was dead and cold by default, anyways.

She pressed her forehead against Chainey’s side, biting her lip as she felt her right side ache with pain. They had survived, somehow, even if Samantha’s entire right side was severely damaged (She didn’t even want to look at it), they were alive.

The woman didn’t know where the explosion had come from, but she assumed it was from upstairs- near Lazaro’s room, to be exact. Samantha felt her stomach churn when she considered the possibilities of that, but her right side hurt too much for her to think too much about it, instead worrying about the current situation they were in.

She eyed Chainey, who seemed to be lost in thought, his eyes unfocused. The woman felt terrible for him, he hadn’t even recuperated from Marianne’s terrifying vivisection and he already as having to deal with the fact that they were caved in after a terrible explosion. She eyed her surroundings trying to find a way to get out.

She couldn’t move, having crawled over to Chainey’s position was already too much of an ordeal for the young woman, she couldn’t get up and do anything. Chainey had super strength though (courtesy of being a weird freak of nature), however Samantha knew very well that he was in no position to actually try and get them out.

“Chainey… can you move?” well, it was worth a try.

She felt him wiggle, trying to move a bit only to hiss sharply, his toes curling as he leaned his head back in a gesture of pain and terror.

“I- everything inside just, I just feel a lot of it.” He bit his lip harder, drawing blood without realizing it. “I can feel all my organs, they just keep touching, and I-“

“It’s okay,” Samantha said as she leaned her head against Chainey’s shoulder once again. The smoke was getting stronger. “It’s okay, I understand.”

 

Chainey, however, didn’t want her to understand. He wanted her to lash out, to blame him, to say something to him- he felt useless at the fact that he couldn’t even move, that he couldn’t get them out of there. He could if he wasn’t so pathetic- if it was Parker, he would have probably gotten out of there long ago.

“Sam…” his voice was choked, holding back sobs as he felt so impotent toward everything, so useless as his friend laid there injured, probably about to die because he couldn’t help.

“Sam, no. Sam, I can’t let this happen.” He said, as she began to shift more and more, his internal organs touching and grinding against each other and Chainey being terribly aware of it, terribly aware of how his insides kept grinding and touching and sliding, but he couldn’t let that stop him. He needed to get them both out of there.

“Chainey-“

“Sam, no! I can’t just lay here, I need to-“ He hissed as he propped himself up, standing tall but ignoring the feeling of his guts. “I need to get us out of here! I can do it!”

Samantha couldn’t do anything but stare as Chainey slowly made his way to the other side of the cave in, every fiber of his body commanding and ordering him to stop, but it didn’t stop him at all. He didn’t even have a goal in mind, the aware just started using his hands to pull apart the rocks, careful to not create a more dangerous cave in as he did so, his hands aching and his organs twisting, the scar of his vivisection churning raw as he felt every stitch itch and burn and crawl and yet no matter how much it hurt, he would continue. He didn’t stop, even if Samantha protested about it behind him, he needed to get them both out of there.

 

Chainey didn’t know how much time actually passed, his fingers sore and scrapped with some fingernails having come off, the teenager had finally managed to create an opening big enough for him and Samantha to leave. His intestines were sore, feeling raw and mutilated as he clutched his stomach at the raw feeling of his guts scraping together, but he still needed to get them out of there.

“Sam, can you walk?” He asked, hissing as he clutched his stomach harder with his scrapped fingers, feeling the still fresh stitches of his surgery.

The young woman shifted on her place, trying to prop herself up with her good arm only to slip as she whined in pain, her right leg too damaged for her to stand.

“No,” she said slightly defeated, but Chainey quickly made his next move- still ignoring the aching pain inside of him, he walked as fast as he could towards Samantha, gently scooping her up to not damage her right arm, her left arm holding unto his neck for more support.

“Chainey, you don’t-“

“Sam, I need to get you out of here! We’ll figure me later!” he practically yelled, as he carried Samantha out of the room, reaching the empty smoke filled hallway as they made their way downstairs.

 

\---

 

Parker’s first instinct was to run towards the infirmary, Chainey being there and being a potential target for a bomb. It was hard to run across the building, debris lying in random places as well as workers rushing to go outside, but he was running way too fast to pay mind to any of them, his feet stomping in the ground as he practically clawed the air to go faster.

The thought of Bastian and Samantha inside the building stung his stomach, but Parker was already so close to the infirmary zone, he couldn’t just turn around like nothing. Several rooms were destroyed, he was actually very lucky that the hallway he as didn’t collapse as well when the explosion happened, but he would thank his luckiness later.

The infirmary was a whole floor near the top of the building, the entire area smelling of rotten flesh, smoke and more things that Parker rather not identify. He tried to remember what room he was in, but even if he remembered the entire place was misshapen to the point of on recognition.

There was no way he could find him, but he had to try.

 

“Chainey! Chainey!” he yelled as he ran across the debris, trying to open doors that lead to rooms only to be greeted by hubris, destruction and dead bodies (none of them any he knew in particular). It wasn’t until he heard a familiar voice that he stopped.

“Parker?”

“Chainey!” Parker practically cried out, a huge weight lifting off his shoulders as he looked for the source of the seemingly not injured voice.

“Parker! You’re alright!” Called out Chainey’s tired voice, as he evaded rubble slowly as he carried Samantha, her forehead pressed against his neck as her right arm hung limply at her side, her left one holding Chainey’s neck, she smiled softly as she eyed the brunette.

“Samantha! Oh no, oh God no!” Parker tried to touch her, but retreated his fingers terrified of hurting her. “What happened, are you okay?!”

“I’m fine Parker,” her voice tried to be calm, trying to reassure the young Aware that her situation wasn’t that bad. “I just need to go to a hospital, I’ll be fine.”

“I’m taking her down,” he said, but suddenly getting worried. “Do you… Do you think they’ll shoot at me? For being an aware?”

Parker hadn’t considered that possibility, but right now they needed to think about another things.

“I can’t think of that right now! Bastian was inside the building too, I think!”

“Noah and Lazaro too…” Samantha almost whispered, her brow furrowed as she tried to hold off the pain.

“I’m,” Parker shaky fingers went through his hair as he tried to keep calm, figuring out what to do “Chainey, take Samantha to the medics- try to not be seen, we don’t know how they will react to you, just- take care of that, sorry.” Parker bit his lip hard.

“I’ll go search for them! Go!” Parker would have shoved them away, but that would probably hurt Samantha even more, instead just gesturing them to leave. Chainey obliged, frowning as he made his way down the stairs.

 

And again, he was all alone, his fingers twitching as he felt the time running out. He didn’t know who to search for first, but that didn’t matter- Parker bolted out as he began to search for any survivor, no matter who it was.

So far, it seemed like the only thing he found were dead bodies and empty rooms, unable to find anything alive on the buildings, Parker as feeling how the nervousness crept into his stomach as he began to panic that he couldn’t find anybody around.

He didn’t even know at what floor he was currently in, having traveled up and down so many times he lost count- it seemed that whatever floor it was it had been close from the blast, not too close to be complete destruction but close enough to have caused some cave ins.

Parker bit his finger as he approached the ruined hallway, his fingers pressed against the rock as he hoped that there were either no one inside, or if there was they were still alive.

“Is anybody there?!” he yelled on top of his lungs, pressing his ear against the cool rock as he awaited for an answer.

He heard mumbling inside, but couldn’t make what it said- it didn’t matter, that was enough for the teenager to grab the stones blocking the way, throwing them away as he tried to make an opening big enough for him to crawl in.

“Hello?” he called out, crawling inside the cave in carefully to not bring it down.

“PJ!” a familiar voice called, an exhausted scared voice. Parker crawled his way inside as his eyes became adjusted to the poor light, noticing the figure lying in the ground and the other one crouching beside him.

“Bastian!” Parker yelled out, his stomach dropping when he realized that the teenager was trapped.

“Bastian, oh my God-“ he said, as he turned around to see the woman who simply stared at him in amazement- she had never seen Maggot Boy up so close.

“Go get help!” he commanded to her, to which she nodded rapidly leaving the small cave, making her way downstairs.

“Bastian, are you okay? Can you hear me?” Parker’s voice was now the one full of fear and panic, terrified of what might have happened to Bastian, his friend lying down with half his torso covered by rocks.

“I’m- I don’t know,” he admitted sadly. “I can’t feel anything, but I think it’s the rocks and I- I just-“

“Look, it’ll be okay. I’m going to push these rocks off you, okay?”

Bastian widened his eyes, but then nodded slowly as he grit his teeth, ready for the sudden movements.

“Okay… okay.” Parker sighed to himself as he began to gently try to get the rocks off him- but it was useless, he would need to drag Bastian out of it.

“Okay, listen, I’m going to drag you out, alright?” Bastian eyes widened even more as he was unsure if it was the right solution. “It’s the only way, Bastian.”

“Okay… okay, do it. Do it.”

Parker firmly gripped at Bastian hands, taking a deep breath as he pulled on the teenager- strangely enough, it was easy to do so, he didn’t hurt Bastian too much and it seemed like the cave didn’t collapse above them.

“Thank God,” Bastian said as he realized he could move his legs if only very little, them being very hurt. “Thank you, Parker, thank you…”

“It’s okay, don’t worry.” Parker said panting. Now, he didn’t know if he should carry Bastian outside, or wait for the emergency services to arrive. He still needed to search for Noah, Lazaro and other survivors, but Bastian could barely walk and he needed medical attention as soon as possible. But, taking him would mean stopping his search for the others-

 

His thoughts were interrupted by a voice from out of the cave in.

“Hello?! Is anybody there?!” Bastian eyes dilated when he heard the voice, Parker felt sudden confusion because he knew he knew the voice, but it was impossible for him to be there, there was no possible way he-

 

Their faces were illuminated by Davey’s phone, Parker eyes closing at the sudden pain in his eyes as his brother stared at him.

His phone fell, the screen shattering, leaving them in darkness.

 

\---

 

Marianne’s long fingers switched channels of the not-to-expensive television set, she wasn’t the kind of person to sit down and watch anything, really, but the current situation deserved it, every channel talking about the current bombing and the situation. She sipped the tea on her hand, carefully placing it afterwards on the coffee table, her legs gently closed as her hands rest on her lap, the remote next to her.

“Half hour has passed since the explosion at Palmer’s Institution of the Dead, most of the workers had evacuated the building but we are getting reports that there are people still trapped inside.” The reporter in the scene said as the camera pointed to the building. The exterior was heavily damaged, fire coming from one of the top floors as smoke filled the sky.

“The authorities believe that Lazaro Palmer is still inside of the building, as we haven’t seen him among the people that left the premises after the explosion.”

Marianne took another sip of her tea, as she increased the volume on the screen.

“Due to the nature of the explosion and its location it is heavily speculated that it was caused by a bomb, the culprits unknown but authorities heavily believe that it was caused by the organization known as “The Cult”, having committed previous bombings in the past during the rise of the dead. Currently emergency services are speculating the location of a second bomb inside of the building, we will report-”

She changed channels, the next one talking about all of Lazaro’s accomplishment. She changed channels once again, now this one talking about the Cult previous attacks.

Marianne turned off the television, sipping her tea as a sly smile appeared on her face.

Even if she didn’t expect any of that to happen, she still felt delight at how the current events were unfolding.

 

\---

 

The harsh lights of the hospital ceiling hurt his eyes as he woke, Micah squinting at them as he tried to get adjusted to the light.

“What, where-“ he grunted, he was still being rushed inside.

“You are in the hospital,” one of the nurses leaned down as they kept moving him towards one of the rooms. “You were in an explosion and we need to check if you are okay.”

“What, that’s stupid.” Micah couldn’t help but mutter. “I’m okay, I just fell and fainted.”

“We need to make sure,” the nurse said as they finally put him in one of the rooms. “There could be internal-“

“I am fine!” he yelled now, sitting straight as he looked around- there were many people being rushed inside of the emergency room, people whom he assumed were inside of the building with blood in their bodies, some arms- they seemed pretty mangled. The teenager felt embarrassed at how he actually was fine compared to them.

“It will be just a quick check up- we need to make sure.”

Micah obliged, as there was nothing else he could actually do.

 

“You seem to be okay-“

“That’s what I’ve been telling you this entire time!” Micah almost shouted.

He stared at the people who kept getting in and out, the nurses and doctors running around as well as they tried to control the current chaos.

“Davey Jones?”

“What?” the nurse asked not exactly understanding Micah.

“Davey Jones, he’s my friend- he was with me, have you admitted someone named Davey Jones?”

The nurse moved her eyes, as if trying to remember.

“A teenager, red hoodie, brown hair-“

The nurse bit her lip. “I don’t think we have admitted someone like that, you are the only teenager that’s here due to the explosion, I believe.”

“If you find him,” Micah’s voice was practically pleading now. “Can you please tell me?”

Before the nurse could reply anything, a suited man stormed to where he was, his long hair swinging side to side, his face contorted in a mixture of horror and anger. Micah bit the inside of his cheek as his father stormed up to him.

“Sir-“

“I’m his father,” he interrupted as he stood next to Micah’s bed, the teenager staring up at him worried.

“He is fine, sir. Some scrapes and wounds but nothing to be worried about,” the nurse said hurriedly as she squirmed, feeling uncomfortable being glared at by the kid’s father. She nodded her head. “I’ll leave you two alone, if you need anything please call me.”

She left, leaving the man alone with his son in the not-too-private hospital room.

“Micah,” For some reason, the teenager thought his father would be mad at him, especially by the tone of his voice.

But instead, his father couldn’t help shed tears, in desperation and happiness that his son was in fact, alive.

Micah eyes widened- he had never seen his father act like that. Never. He never actually expected his father to be worried about him, he just didn’t think of him as that kind of person. Clearly, he was very wrong.

“Dad-“

“It’s okay, I just-“ he tried to regain his composure, whipping off the tears with the sleeve of his incredibly expensive suit (!!!) “I was very worried, when I heard the explosion. You could have died…”

Micah’s face grimaced, not expecting him to be in that sort of “I almost died” situation more than once.

“I’m okay,” Micah reassured, not knowing what else to say- he wasn’t good at comforting people at all, specially his father.

“Dad,” he tried to change the topic, hoping that would calm his father down. “Davey was with me, but I don’t know if he is here, or where he is-“

“I’ll search for him,” his father said, as he made his way out of the room ready to search the entire hospital for the teenager, Micah feeling slightly touched at how his father would do everything for him, but feeling alone when he left.

His father was never good with words, anyways.

 

\---

 

The phone laid shattered on the ground, several pieces of it laying at the teenager’s feet as he stared.

Just stared.

 

Davey couldn’t understand.

Parker was dead. He watched as his little brother died.

Parker was dead. He mourned him.

And yet Parker was staring at him, his once green eyes now grey, his face decorated with so many terrifying scars, stitches… his once pale skin now greying, rotten.

Davey couldn’t understand what was happening, his brother was _dead._

 

Parker felt his brother’s stare, Davey’s blue eyes staring at him, his mouth slightly agape as he stared.

It was that moment that Parker realized that his big brother, Davey, was staring right at him.

He wanted to say something, but he didn’t know how, his throat closing as his fingers shook, his entire small frame shaking in a mixture of horror and anxiety as his brother continued to stare at him, looking at his face while he was still, his shattered phone still lying pathetically on the ground.

Parker opened his mouth, and then closed it having no idea what to actually _say_ , not aware of how many minutes have passed since Davey found them. He opened his mouth again, but instead of works a choked whine came from his throat.

He opened his mouth once more, this time he managed to speak.

“Davey…” it was a small choked whine, panting as he couldn’t bring himself to stare at his own brother’s eyes, but he did so- he had to. It was his brother.

Davey’s expression was blank, as if the teenager was trying to fully comprehend what was happening, the last memory of his little brother being cheerful and alive, not… _this_.

His face contorted in sudden understanding, his eyes staring at the floor for one second as he fully comprehended everything.

 

The corner of Davey’s mouth contorted, showing his teeth into a snarl, his eyebrows burrowing as his eyes widened. Parker had only seen his brother’s face twist into that once, and Davey had been suspended for a month after it. Parker’s throat clenched in guilt and fear, the realization that Davey hated him dawning on him, his only brother openly hating him and being so _hateful_ , so-

“Who did this to you?”

He was so surprised by the question Parker legitimately didn’t know what he was talking about.

“…What?” the dead teen muttered, his brows furrowed in concern.

“Who did this to you?!” the taller teenager practically yelled as he pointed to Parker’s face, his immediate reaction was to pass his fingers through his face, his fingertips touching all the scars he had, the stitches- all those wounds.

“You are maggot boy…” he stuttered, covering his mouth with his palm, curling into himself as if he was about to vomit- but he didn’t, instead he just curled up to himself shivering.

“You… you…” Davey choked out until he got up, exciting the small cave in a hurry.

“Davey!” Parker shouted after him, quickly making his way to where his brother had left- in reality, his older brother was still in the hallway leaning his side against the wall, Parker could tell he was severely shaking.

“Davey…” Parker whimpered, getting close to his brother not knowing how he would react.

“Why?” it was more of a demand than a question, Parker didn’t answer as he stayed still behind his brother.

“Why did this happen to you?! How could this happen to you?!” Davey shouted now at no one in particular, his fingers clawing at his own hair as he curled up to himself, gritting his teeth as he tried his hardest to not cry.

“You don’t fucking deserve this! You don’t deserve any of this!” his throat went hoarse, but he kept screaming.

“Davey, I’m so sorry.” Now Parker was the one that was crying, tears falling down his scarred cheeks as he slowly approached his brother. “I am so so sorry, I wanted to tell you, but-“

The tears kept falling, much more now as it became difficult to talk.

“I didn’t want you to know this happened to me! Look at me! I didn’t want you to know! I am so sorry Davey, I just- I couldn’t put you through that. I am supposed to be dead! Not this!” he began to scream as well, wailing, his eyes puffed due to all the tears coming.

“I would have understood, I would-“ Davey didn’t know if he was saying this to himself or Parker, his stomach twisting into confusion, sorrow- every feeling, Davey had no idea how he felt. He felt too much all at once, it was far too overwhelming to him.

“I didn’t want you to find out! I didn’t want anybody to find out! Look at me, Davey! Look at what the fuck I am!”

Reluctantly, Davey turned around staring at his brother’s broken form.

 

The little brother he knew full of life was gone, his face full of scars, his eyes exhausted as wounds decorated his body, clothes torn apart and ripped in several places.

Davey stopped trying, openly crying now that he stared at his brother.

“This,” Parker frantically passed his fingers across his body, across his face, across every place he had been pierced, shot at, bitten, torn open- his movements completely erratic as the young teen panicked. “I wanted to tell you, but didn’t know how. And then, it just got worse and worse, and I had to stop the killer, and I-“ he gripped at his hair, pulling it as tears kept flowing.

“I couldn’t, I couldn’t do that to you. I’m so sorry, I’m-“

He cried loudly, messily, crumpling on the floor as he felt everything that had happened since his death catch up with him, tearing him from the inside. Parker couldn’t stop crying at his death, how he died, the fact that he had died. The fact that he had died and somehow he was still there, a mockery of life, having to eat people only to pretend to still be alive.

“I’m sorry,” Davey said between sobs, still crying loudly as well as he leaned down to his brother, pulling him close and enveloping him in a hug, the much larger teen successfully enveloping him from the outside world.

“I’m so sorry this happened to you. I’m so sorry, Parker. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

Parker stuck his face against Davey’s shoulder, soaking him with his tears as he muttered apologies as well.

 

“Davey, we need to get Bastian out of here.” Parker whispered into Davey’s shoulder, who nodded silently. Slowly, they both stood up as they went over Bastian who continued to lay on the ground, the teen didn’t mind them suddenly running off- after all, it had been a very emotional moment.

“Bastian…” Davey said softly, as he crouched down to his friend. “You knew?”

The injured teen bit his lip, not able to look at him in the eye. “I’m so sorry, Davey, I promised…”

Davey crunched his face in pain, but he understood. Besides, it wasn’t the time nor place.

“It’s okay.” Davey examined Bastian, he didn’t seem to be too injured. “Can you walk?”

“It hurts too much.” Bastian hissed as he tried to move his legs, he would have to be carried.

“Okay, Peej, help me.” He crouched down as his little brother understood what he wanted to do. Carefully, Parker loaded Bastian on Davey’s back, giving his friend a piggyback ride. “You okay there, Baz?”

“Yeah, it hurts though.” Bastian hissed as Davey started to move trying not too jostle him too much but quickly, they needed to get out of there.

“I’ll take you to the first floor,” Parker huffed as he was guiding them. “I’ll go back and search for-“

“Peej, no!” Davey shouted. “This place is dangerous, you can’t-“

“Davey, there might be more people inside! I have to!” Davey didn’t say anything else, grunting in disapproval as they continued to walk.

“Shit, this exit is blocked,” Parker said as the stairs were blocked by debris- this was bad, that wasn’t there before. The building was starting to crumple down.

“Come on, there’s another set of stairs over here-“

 

Parker words died down as he saw the small figured, riddled with bullet holes and seeping red, standing in front of the hallway as he licked his lips.

Owen would have laughed, but he didn’t have the energy to do so.

 

\---

 

It had happened too fast, from the moment Owen leaped as he started to eat alive the leader of the Cult, his buddies kept shooting at him but it did nothing to Owen, and as soon as he had killed his first target, he quickly got rid of the rest of them.

Burying the knife deep into their skull,

Ripping off one of their limbs,

Ripping off their intestines,

Digging his fingers through their eyes,

 

Too easy, far too easy, the bullets lodging into his body but he still kept going, he wasn’t hungry anymore, it wasn’t a matter of hunger or turning into an animal it was a matter of these people thinking they could control him, thinking that they were different and special from the others, thinking and believing the fact that they think they even deserve the right to not be judged. How dare them. How dare them pretend that they would treat him differently, had he been alive and had the circumstances been different, they would have treated him like garbage like everybody else.

They didn’t deserve the right to think they were different.

 

Owen had no idea how many he ended up killing, quickly scanning over the room believing that they were over thirty dead cultists lying around. He licked his lip nonchalantly, limping outside as he tried to make his way to the ground floors, blood seeping from every hole in his body, the feeling of the bullets inside of him grinding against his flesh was unbearable.

He kept walking, however. There was nothing else he could do, no place to go, no place to escape to. It was over, it was everything over, this pathetic game he had been playing for so long was over and the only thing he wondered was how he would die.

 

He had to die. There was absolutely no other way to go, he HAD to die, the alternative of becoming the newest science experiment for Lazaro too disgusting even for him, he wasn’t going to let himself become that.

He was so tired, too tired, his feet barely moving as he walked aimlessly around the building, police and ambulance sirens noticeable in the background. He wondered if the police would kill him if he suddenly jumped out of the building.

Owen chuckled at the possibility.

 

He climbed up the stairs, not even knowing in what floor he was- is legs were taking him to god knows where as stopped in the middle of the hallway, the blood dripping from every orifice in his body, blood spilling from his nose and mouth.

He stared as Parker and his friends (Bastian… Bastian, his name echoing in his mind as well, not as strongly as Parker however) appeared, horrified to see him alive and well.

Parker’s sudden intrusion didn’t surprise Owen at all.

 

After all, after all this time and after everything that had happened, Owen figured that they weren’t mean to be apart


	16. Grounds for Divorce

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There’s a hole in my neighborhood  
> Down which of late I cannot help but fall

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It hurts.

“Owen…” Parker muttered in disbelief at the aware standing in front of him. Owen was a mess- his entire frame was covered in blood, his clothes ripped apart at places. His eyes were unfocused, staring at them but not actually paying attention as blood dripped from his mouth and nose, along with drool and eyes half closed.

“Parker…” Owen whispered as well, chuckling in a strange bizarre manner.

“I just keep bumping into you, don’t I?” he wiped his mouth, the drool and blood off it with his fingers. “Do you know what happened, Parker? Do you, Maggot Boy?”

The three of them stared at him, his movements jerky, swinging one of the axes one of the cultists was using previously, as if it was some sort of toy that had no weight.

“The cult put the bomb, what a twist!” he chuckled, spitting blood and pieces of bone lodging in his teeth. “then they wanted to get me out of the basement, just before they cuuuut me right open, like a frog. You know, like they did to you!”

He pointed at Parker with the axe, the brunette baring his teeth as both Davey and Bastian widened their eyes in horrible realization.

“But, the bomb happened, and they went to the basement. The cult. They cut me free. Want to know what I did, then?” He nervously licked his fingers with the axe still in hand, his eyes focused on his feet as a pool of blood formed under him.

“I killed them,” he continued to suck on his own fingers. “I killed them all. Ripped off their faces and limbs. Ate them. All of them. They are all dead.”

His brow furrowed, as in sudden confusion. He stared at the three teenagers still staring at him in horror.

“Why are you still here?” he asked, eyes twitching as his head cocked to the sides, trying to understand the meaning of them being there. “There was a bomb. Didn’t you hear?”

His eyes went wide all of sudden, legitimate surprise decorating his face. “You are trapped here, aren’t you? You are searching for the exit, aren’t you?”

 

“Are you going to let us pass?” Parker hissed, fists formed as he tried to keep a threatening pose but it was impossible, he had no weapons.

“What?” Owen scrunched his face, blinking trying to understand. “Let you pass?” He negated with his head quickly.

“No,” he said, completely serious. “No, no. Why would I do that? I hate you. I want you to die, Parker, you did this to me! You brought me to this shithole! You brought me here so they could open me up!”

“Owen, let us pass!”

“Or what? What will you do? What can you and your friends possibly do to stop me?” he swung his axe. “I have nothing to lose.”

They could feel a tremor under their feet- the building was very damaged, it could collapse at any moment. Parker swallowed, taking a deep breath.

“Davey,” he said calmly, trying desperately for his voice to not crack. “Hide, I’ll clear the way.”

“You must be really stupid if you think I’ll leave you-“

“ _Davey_ ,” Parker practically begged with his voice. “Please. I’m pleading you. I’ll… I’ll clear the way.”

Davey swallowed harsh, gritting his teeth as he wanted to yell, to scream that no, he will not leave his brother alone- but he had to, he needed to trust his brother.

Biting his lip, the teenager left with Bastian on his back, hiding in one of the rooms that weren’t collapsed.

 

“Wow, how fucking heroic of you.” Said Owen as he swung the axe in the air around him. “Are you going to take me down now?”

Parker didn’t say anything, he simply stared at Owen who continue to swing the axe as he approached Parker.

“Come on, Peej. Say something. Say something about what I did, tell me I’m a bastard.”

Parker fingers twitched, ready to run and tackle him- ready to simply do something, awaiting for anything, any sign to attack.

“That’s what you do. You always tell me how terrible I am. You always tell me,” he used the axe to slam on a window, shattering it on pieces that flew across the scene. “How terrible I am. I a monster, right? Say it. I know you want to. Tell me how much of a monster I am!”

Owen slammed the axe to the ground, shattering the tiles beneath him as he huffed, his shoulders rising up and down in frenzy.

“There’s no way out.” The redhead chuckled, as tears began to fall from his eyes. “There is no way out, is it?”

“Owen…” Parker intruded, panic rising through his body as the brunette had absolute no idea what to do or say to calm the murderer down.

 

“This shit- my life, this- this _place_ , there is no way out!” he continued to laugh nervously, his eyes still staring at the broken tiles.

“Owen-“

The redhead raised the axe, swinging it in the air trying to attack Parker and barely missing the brunette’s face- Immediately Parker threw himself backwards, no weapon to counterattack with.

“Fuck you!” Owen screamed as he continued to swing, his target barely able to dodge every one of his attacks. “Fuck you! Fuck Chainey! Fuck Bastian! Fuck Lazaro- Fuck you! Fuck you Parker! _Fuck you!_ ” he continued to scream, eventually able to hit Parker in the stomach and opening a big gash.

The teen doubled over, blood dripping from his wound, not too big or deep enough for his organs to spill however. Lifting his head, he saw Owen lifting the axe in the air ready to split Parker’s head with it.

“No!” Parker screamed as Owen brought down the axe, putting his arms up in an instinct and catching the blade with one, the wooden handle with the other hand. The hand that stopped the blade began to bleed, as Owen kept shoving it down in an attempt to bury it in his opponent’s head.

“Owen, stop!” Parker choked out, the blood dripping from his stomach and hand as he struggled to stop the blade from killing him. “Stop this!”

“Why?!” Owen screeched. “Why should I, I’m going to die here anyways- and if I don’t, I’ll become one of their little science experiments, just like you did!”

With the strength of the push, the wooden handle broke, the force making Owen land on his face on the ground as Parker finally managed to manipulate the blade itself. Quickly, with the broken handle Owen jumped tackling Parker to the ground, pinning the small teenager down.

“Owen-“

 

Parker coughed blood, vomiting it on Owen’s face as the redhead buried the broken handle on the middle of Parker’s stomach, burying it until it went through Parker’s back, completely piercing him.

The brunette clawed at the ground, blood spilling from his mouth as he hissed while Owen kept wiggling the broken wooden stick.

“Did it hurt when you died?” Owen whispered, his shaky fingers rubbing at his forehead leaving bloody fingertips on it. “Were you conscious? Did you feel yourself dying?”

Parker coughed, blood splattering on Owen face even more but the redhead did nothing about it.

“When I died, I thought-“ He covered his mouth, leaving even more blood on his face. “I thought it would be it. I wanted that to be it, to die and be dead forever! I mean, that’s what normally should happen, right?”

“O-own-“ Parker gurgled his words, blood bubbles forming on his lips as he attempted to talk.

“It didn’t, though!” he began to laugh. “It’s so funny, right? I’m laughing! I’m laughing so it’s funny! Ahahaha!”

Then he stared down at Parker, the hint of a smile on his lips, cheeks lightly twitching, eyes red and glassy from tears.

“Do you want to die?”

Parker negated slowly, grinding his teeth as Owen continued to sit on top of the teen.

“Come on, Parker.” He said softly. “You can’t possibly tell me you like this, you prefer this than death!” He twisted the handle on Parker’s stomach, the brunette twisting and hissing.

“Tell me you want to die, Parker! Tell me you want your miserable,” he twisted “pathetic,” he dug his nails on his skin. “insignificant,” Parker screamed but only blood came out. “mockery of a life to end!” Tears fell from the brunette’s eyes. “Tell me you want to die!”

“I-I…” Parker tried his hardest to talk, the pressure of Owen sitting on top of him and the wooden handle made it difficult for him to reply. Owen leaned with a smile, waiting for Parker to respond.

“Yes?” Owen smiled, his blood soaked teeth showing. “Tell me Peej, you…?”

“I… I…” Parker clenched his teeth, a whine escaping his mouth.

“You what?” He leaned so close to his face, Parker could smell the rotten flesh and blood from his lips.

“I don’t want to die.”

 

Owen’s mouth twisted multiple times, gesturing with his lips as guttural sounds came from his throat, his throat muscles contorting and twitching as the redhead pulled out the wooden stick off Parker, aiming it to pierce Parker’s head.

Reacting quickly the brunette used the moment Owen pulled the wood out of him to shove him off him as hard as he could, sending the small teen stumbling unto his back.

Before Owen could get up, Parker grabbed the axe blade near him, standing up quickly as Owen lunged with the wooden stick.

Swinging the blade, Parker was able to break in half the wooden handle, two pieces remaining pathetically on Owen’s hands.

Owen threw the broken wood aside, lunging to Parker as he tackled the teenager once again in the ground- he knocked the air out of the brunette, ripping the blade from his hands. Eyes wide, Parker was sure that Owen would split his head in two; however, he didn’t expect at all what was going to happen next.

Owen leaned on him, taking a chunk of meat from Parker’s shoulder, ripping it off with his teeth.

 

\---

 

“I’m sorry.”

Davey looked at Bastian for a second, then looking away almost immediately; he was sweating, fingers shook as he played with small pebbles on the ground, crushing them between his fingertips.

“I’m sorry I never told you, Davey.”

Davey still didn’t look at Bastian, his eyes dancing at the ground as he tried his hardest to ignore the shouting that came from the hall nearby, where his dead little brother was fighting the serial killer, knot on his throat and stomach cold.

“He promised me to not tell you…”

“It’s okay.” Davey nervously said to himself, not even sure if he was reassuring Bastian or himself at that moment.

“It’s not- I don’t know, Davey, what was I supposed to do?!” Bastian began screaming, Davey still twitching and nervously jittering on place. “Your dead brother suddenly appears, ask me to not tell you anything, and I say yes. I should have told you! I should have told you what happened to him!”

At that point, Davey knew that Bastian was more upset with himself than anything.

“I’m a terrible friend, I- I couldn’t even help him back then, when he _died_ ,” he began pulling at his own hair in desperation. “and I couldn’t even help him now! When he needed me!”

“He needed us all, Bastian.” Davey bit his lip, another scream from the hallway sending a shiver down his spine. “He needed us but he refused to let us help him.”

The brunette looked at the ground once more, noticing how the ground began to shake if ever so slightly. “I would have done the same…”

“We need to do something!” Bastian tried to get up, only to fall to his behind.

Davey grabbed his head, his fingertips pressing against his scalp. What should they do? Davey desperately wanted to rush in and help his little brother, but fear paralyzed him, still digesting the fact that his little brother who died several months ago wasn’t actually dead, the fact that Parker had to go through everything alone made Davey felt like he had failed as a brother.

The floor shook once again.

“The cult did this, didn’t they?” Davey whispered mostly to himself, but Bastian nodded not paying much attention.

“They wanted to take that guy out,” Davey started to connect the dots. “you know, rescue the killer. Take him away.”

Bastian nodded quickly again, sweat rolling down his forehead as he attempted to ignore the screams as well.

“Don’t you think,” Davey fingers moved quickly, as if he was trying to physically make sense of what was happening. “That it’s strange that there was only one bomb?”

“Davey,” Bastian leaned in as he suddenly understood what Davey was getting at. “Do you think there is another bomb?”

“The plan,” the brunette stood up from his crouching position, pacing around the small enclosure as he felt the shaking movements beneath his feet. “Was to make a bomb, take the killer out, right? They hate the institution, and there wasn’t that big damage.”

Davey buried his head on his hands, taking deep breaths as if to calm himself down. “There is the chance there is another bomb.”

“But they can’t detonate it, right? Owen said that he killed them all.”

“But there is still a bomb! If there is still a bomb, the building shaking and rumbling may set it off!” Davey began to desperately yell. “We need to get out of here! We need to get PJ out of here!” The brunette suddenly realized as he ran out of the room.

“Davey, wait!” Bastian tried to get up again, this time succeeding with a limp as he followed his friend as fast as he could.

 

Davey felt anxiety build up from the bottom of his stomach, rising and rising until it reached his throat, tears pouring out from his eyes as he kept running towards his brother.

His little dead brother.

 

\---

 

“This is ridiculous, I am absolutely fine!” Noah screamed as he tried to stand up from the hospital bed, two nurses having to shove him down once again.

“Sir, you are severely hurt, we need you to stay here please!” one of the nurses said, trying to get the man to lay down.

“I need to get back there! I need to make sure they get everybody out!” Noah trashed in the bed.

“Sir, please! You are only making everything harder! We have more people to attend and you are making everything harder for us!”

Noah stopped trashing and squirming, realizing how immature he was being; he slightly blushed as he finally set himself in the bed.

“Good.” Said the doctor as the nurses regained their breath, happy they managed to calm the man down. “You haven’t sustained mortal injuries but you will still have to stay here…”

The doctor continued to talk but Noah’s mind was racing- he didn’t care. He needed to know wherever everybody got out in time, if everybody was okay- his mind was racing with several thought he didn’t know how to focus on only one thing.

“Are there any casualties?” he asked to one of the nurses, who stared at him slightly surprised.

“Excuse me?”

“Do you know if anybody died at the bomb attack?” He asked once more.

“I don’t know- there are still so many injured… We are trying our best, sir.”

She suddenly looked around, realizing she needed to be on other places.

“I am sorry sir but I must go, press the button if you need anything!” the young nurse said as she ran towards the other patients that needed her help.

“Wait! I need to know!” Noah reached out to stand again but felt a sharp pain on his abdomen, the adrenaline wearing off and the pain catching up with him.

Quickly, Noah looked around the room, trying to find anything he could use for _anything_ , at that moment Noah didn’t even know what he was exactly looking for.

He saw the television set in the ceiling on one corner of the big room, Noah frantically looked for anything that resembled a phone- after having to stretch himself to retrieve it from the small table beside him, Noah managed to grab the remote control, quickly fidgeting with it as he turned on the television, raising the volume to its maximum level so he could listen despite to the hollering outside in the hospital hallways.

 

“-The emergency services haven’t been able to enter the building, the authorities believe the possibility of another bomb being planted in the building. It is very likely that Lazaro Palmer is still inside the building, none of the emergency services have spotted him- chief of the police department tells us that they cannot get inside the building due not only the threat of the bomb, but the threat of the building collapsing. The cult…”

The newswoman kept talking, but it fell deaf to Noah’s ears, headache forming as he processed all the information he just heard.

His heartbeat rose dramatically, a nurse running unto the room with panic on her face, the chaos of the hallways leaking into his room as Noah became suddenly too aware of all the screams, crying, people moving too fast, reality crashing into him as the nurse injected something in his arm.

 

\---

 

 

Blood dripped from Owen’s mouth as he swallowed the chunk of meat he ripped off from Parker’s shoulder. He panted as drool fell off his mouth and into Parker’s chest.

Parker remained under him, breath hitched, unable to move not only due to Owen sitting on him but because he was terrified out of his mind, unable to do anything but stare up at Owen.

The ground shook under them.

“I’m alone,” Owen said almost whispering as he stared at the blank space in the wall, saying to no one in particular, Parker stared up at him hazily.

His grey eyes traveled down to Parker, the small brunette breathing heavily as blood poured from the open wound on his shoulder, a small pool of blood gathering under the teenager.

 

Owen quickly reached to the axe blade pathetically lying on the ground, just barely reaching it as he grabbed it with shaky fingers.

He pressed the blade softly against Parker’s throat, the brunette eyes widening, struggling and wiggling under the redhead trying to get away, a drop of blood dripping from the wound.

“Keep me company.”

 

Mustering all the strength he had Parker kicked Owen in the torso, sending the redhead off him losing his balance, Parker used the opportunity to stand to his feet stumbling, still hazy from everything that happened. His first instinct overcame him, as he lunged forward attempting to steal the blade from Owen.

Parker pulled it towards him, but Owen wouldn’t let go. However, with only one arm, Owen struggled as Parker used both his arms to try to take the blade away from him; his fingers getting cut open as he refused to let go from the blade.

“Stop it! Stop all of this!” Parker screamed, using his leg to push Owen away in a final attempt to pry the axe blade from him.

“Ack!” Owen shouted as Parker kicked him once again, the redhead letting go of the blade with bloodied fingers.

“Fuck off!” Parker shouted, his head ringing and buzzing with his legs shaking- he could barely stand, he bared his teeth as he swung the blade on his hands towards Owen, striking him in the torso.

“Just fuck off!” He screamed again walking towards Owen, caging the brunette against the wall and against himself. Parker rose the blade, his eyes wide with blood and dirt covering his face, hair.

Owen eyes widened as he saw the blade above Parker’s head, for a split second his grey eyes reflecting the understanding of what was going on, and what was going to happen to him.

For a split second, there was fear on his eyes.

 

Parker struck down.

 

The blade split clothes and skin, muscle as it reached one of Owen ribs as blood splattered over Parker’s clothes, Owen’s hand reaching over Parker’s shoulder and gripping in pain, mouth open as blood spilled from it along with drool and his eyes stared at Parker’s.

 

Parker struck again.

Again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again again

 

He stopped.

 

Parker took a step back, blood covering his face, hair, clothes- blood everywhere, not his blood not his blood- not his blood.

Not his blood- it covered him everywhere as he breathed in and out in and out and he stared as everything was covered with blood. Not his blood. Not his blood. He stared.

He stared.

He stared at Owen.

_Not his blood._

 

The redhead whimpered, his guts sprawled across the floor, his blood on every surface and on every bit of Parker and on himself. Everything was red. He could only see red.

And yet he wasn’t dead.

The blade slipped off from Parker fingers as it crashed harshly in the ground, clanging loud as Parker covered his mouth with his hands smearing even more blood on himself.

“Oh,” the brunette let out as a pathetic whimper, tears spilling from his eyes.

The brunette started to back away.

“D-“ Owen words were sobs, he looked down to himself and he saw the mess that his body was, pathetically lying on the ground unable to move. And yet, he was still alive. And yet, he was still owned by the Institution.

And they wouldn’t let him die.

“Don’t leave me,” Owen managed to sputter out, coughing blood as he stared at Parker eyes, Parker big grey eyes covered on his blood.

His own blood.

 

“Don’t leave me here!” Owen shouted louder now, spitting more blood now as Parker only flinched at the sound of Owen’s voice.

“Please!  Don’t leave me here! Please!” the redhead was now sobbing, couching and spitting as his guts continued to spill themselves onto the ground.

“I don’t want to be their experiment! Don’t let me be their experiment! I don’t want that to happen to me!” He begged, Parker closed his eyes as he began to openly weep, crouching covering his head with his hands as Owen continued to plead for his death.

“Don’t… Parker, please…” he moaned, Parker still clutching his head on his hands.

Parker didn’t want to listen. Parker didn’t want to think about it, and yet with every wail he was reminded of himself, every sob and every beg only reminded him of what Marianne had done to him, what she did, and what would happen to Owen if he left him there.

He couldn’t. He couldn’t let that happen to Owen.

Owen didn’t deserve that.

 

“Please…” Owen sobbed, Parker staring at his broken body lying on the floor, a mess of organs, skin and blood.

Parker breathed quickly and deep, practically hyperventilating as he stood up, his legs moving numbly as he reached for the bloodied axe blade.

He gripped it, still breathing heavily as he realized how bloody his fingers were, his digits shaking strongly.

God, there was so much blood.

Parker turned around, his head buzzing as if he was underwater, Owen pleads deaf to him as he walked stumbling towards him.

Without realizing it, he was couching in front of Owen, his face close to the redhead.

“Don’t let them touch me.” Owen whispered, face puffy with tears and blood.

“I won’t.” Parker whispered back, placing clumsily the blade against Owen’s throat.

 

Parker began to shove the blade against Owen’s neck, a wet sob escaping from the redhead’s lips as his eyes widened.

He continued to shove it more, and Owen sobbed again.

Parker took a deep breath, he pressed the blade more now as it fully pierced the skin, blood pouring freely, he saw how Owen was fixated on his eyes, trying to lean in closer.

Parker leaned in as well, letting Owen kiss him in the lips.

The brunette could taste the blood off Owen’s mouth, their lips dancing together as Parker continued to cut his head off.

The deeper he pushed the blade, he could taste more blood on Owen’s mouth, spilling into his own mouth. Parker eyes were closed, Owen hot breaths caressing his skin, as if Parker wasn’t just killing him.

Owen grunted in pain, blood escaping his mouth as the axe blade pierced him deeper.

“Don’t, don’t look…” Parker sobbed, guilty that he was killing him, guilty that he was kissing him as he killed him as if nothing was happening, as if they had known each other for so long and were just kissing like there was nothing wrong.

“Parker,” he sputtered, Owen eyes closed as he placed his forehead against the brunette’s.

“I love you.”

 

Parker kissed him, his fingers running across Owen’s scalp as he gave one final push.

 

Owen lips stopped moving.

Owen fingers stopped moving.

Owen head felt weightless as Parker let go of it, Owen’s head landing on the ground with a soft thud.

Owen stopped moving.

Parker’s mouth was covered in blood, his fingers itching and bloody as the body of the boy was sprawled out on the ground.

He wasn’t moving.

 

The brunette sobbed as he stood up, his entire frame shaking as blood dripped from him, staring down at Owen’s mutilated headless body. Without thinking, Parker took off his hoodie, throwing it towards Owen in a miserable attempt to cover up his dead body; after the action Parker doubled over with the intention of puking but nothing came out of his mouth.

“PJ!” He heard someone scream. It was his brother.

“PJ!”

Parker breathed heavily as he limped away from the scene, cleaning the tears off his face with his sleeve.

His head was buzzing, the teenager felt as if he was moving through thick mud, his eyes couldn’t focus on anything as he moved on, walking towards the voices he could barely hear, the floor shaking every minute or so, every time stronger than the last. Everything shook. Everything shook and he couldn’t understand it, he couldn’t understand what happened and what he had done and what was going to happen next, his fingers tingling as his eyes focused on his feet while he limped, limped towards nothing in particular.

“Parker?”

Something called out to him, but he didn’t know what.

“Parker! Oh my god, are you okay?”

Two hands grasped his shoulders, even the one with the wound and slightly shook him. His eyes tried to focus, and Parker finally managed to make out the figure that was shaking him. It was his brother, a worried Bastian at his side.

He looked around, confused as if the brunette couldn’t understand what the question was; his eyes widened as he remembered what happened.

“The path is clear,” Parker said, his eyes staring at Davey blue worried ones. “I cleared the path.”

“What about Owen?” Bastian asked, attempting to touch Parker but not sure if that would be good for the teenager’s current state of mind.

“He’s dead.” Parker muttered as he stared into Bastian eyes.

“Oh, Peej-“ Davey hugged his smaller brother tightly, his fingers digging into the dried blood on his head, digging on his hoodie as Parker slowly was brought down to reality.

The teenager took a deep breath, wrapping his arms around Davey as he began to sob unto his brother’s red hoodie.

“Davey, I killed him. Davey I-“

“Shhh,” Davey said, clinging close to his brother. “It’s okay, Peej. It’s okay.”

“I’m sorry,” Bastian intruded placing a hand on Davey’s back, his friend looking at him concerned. “But we need to go; this place will either explode or fall apart.”

Davey nodded as he let go carefully from his little brother.

“Let’s go,” Parker said as he unwrapped himself from Davey’s grip. Still hazy, Parker guided them towards the end of the stairs.

“There might be another bomb planted here” Davey explained to Parker, who looked up at him and nodded.

“Not surprised.” He muttered, his words still shaky as he continued to walk towards the stairs, avoiding debris as they walked carefully. “They always wanted to destroy this place.”

“Oh my god!” Bastian yelled as he saw Owen’s body covered by the hoodie- Parker refused to look at it, he felt that he had no right to look at him.

“We- fuck. We need to go!” Parker said, practically grabbing Davey and Bastian and dragging them behind him. “We have to leave!”

“Parker,” Davey shouted as he noticed how frantically his brother was breathing, the way he gripped at his arm and how frantic he looked.

“Parker! It’s okay!”

“It’s not okay, Davey!” Parker stopped, staring at his brother, his face contorted in panic.

“I killed him! I killed Owen! I murdered him!” He hissed, panting frantically. “Look at me! Look at what I’ve become! How can you say this is okay?!”

“We can help you, Peej.” Bastian approached him, ruffling the brunette’s dirty dusty and bloodied hair with his hands. “We need to get out, we need to-“

 

The building shook once again, the ceiling above them cracking, splitting into several pieces as they went crashing to the ground. Parker felt time slow down as he looked up at the boulders falling, about to crash and crush them all.

He saw himself out of his body, grabbing both Bastian and Davey as he pushed them out of the way, as far away as possible, everything feeling heavy and slow as the boulders kept coming down.

He pushed them out of the way. He managed to push them out of the way, but there was no time, he tried to leap out of the way as well, but there was no time. There was no time. He saw how Davey shouted something but he didn’t hear it. He saw how Bastian eyes widened and his mouth hung open but he didn’t register it. He didn’t register the boulder crashing against him, everything turning into a horrifying color of grey and dust and there was so much dust.

There was no time.

 

\---

 

Chainey felt the building shake, he hugged Samantha close worried that she would get hurt even more.

“Shit…!” Chainey muttered as he tried to not lose his balance while the building continued to shake, a loud crash was heard from one of the buildings above.

“This place is going down!” He whispered to himself.

“We are near the lobby,” Samantha said hissing in pain as blood kept running down her arm.

“Sam, hang on, okay!” Chainey said aloud, as he continued to trek through the ruins of the place.

“There’s the exit!” Samantha said loudly, and sure there was the exit- reporters, paramedic services, police men- many people gathered near the building, but all were too terrified to enter the building.

Chainey growled angry that they weren’t helping, but he had no time to be upset. He needed to get Samantha out of there.

“Wait, Chainey no!” Sam said as Chainey continued to head towards the exit. “Leave me here! Everybody will see you! You need to-“

“I don’t care, Sam! I don’t care if they see me! I need to help you and Peej!”

“But if they see you-“

“That is the least of my problems right now!”

He huffed, he breathed heavily as he ran towards the exit, towards the cameras and everybody outside; he braced himself for what he was going to do, but he didn’t care. At the moment, he was not important- he needed to help not only Samantha, but Parker and anybody that could have possibly been stuck inside the building.

That’s all that mattered.

 

The moment he exited the building he felt all the eyes on him, but Chainey ignored them. He ignored all of the stares, the flashes- he had to ignore them.

“I need a doctor!” he yelled, as he carefully placed Samantha on the ground, taking care of not hurting her further. “She’s hurt, she needs a doctor!”

Immediately paramedics rushed over to the pair, but before they were too close Chainey ran inside the building once again.

“Wait, Chainey!” Samantha yelled, hoping to stop the young man, but it was to no avail. The aware entered the building once again hoping to help Parker.

“Ma’am, please stay still.” Said one of the paramedics as they put the gurney to her level, some paramedics carefully loading her in the bed. “Ma’am, what’s your name?”

“It’s- Samantha Hyde,” she replied as she stared inside the building. “There are more people inside! Why is no one helping?!”

“There is the high chance that there is a bomb inside, Ma’am.”

“A bomb?!” Samantha shouted, trying to get off the gurney but being stopped by the paramedics.

“Ma’am, please! We will take you to the hospital! There is nothing you can do!”

Samantha cringed against the gurney as she was being loaded into an ambulance, knowing that the paramedic was right, there was nothing she could do.

 

Samantha wasn’t aware at what moment she fell asleep, waking up in the hospital room already.

Groggily, she stared at her injured arm now bandaged, she tried to move but her body hurt too much to make more attempts. Sighing, Samantha looked around her, spotting the television that was on the corner.

The woman was too out of it to recognize what they were talking about, and she didn’t make out the images that were on the television. She stared at it for a while, and recognized the Institution building, but that was it- the volume was too low for her to listen.

She stared at the hallway, noticing everybody running outside.

“Excuse me-“ Samantha surprised herself by how hoarse her throat was, coughing a little.

 

“Sam? Are you awake?” a voice called from her side. With some effort, the redhead shifted towards the voice calling to her, even though she knew who it was.

“Noah?”

The man sighed relieved, Samantha felt bad by how pale how Noah looked like in the hospital bed.

“I’m glad you managed to get out of there,” Noah sighed as he passed his fingers through his hair groggily, his arm slightly shaking. “Is, who else got out? Is everybody okay?”

Samantha blinked slowly ashamed that she had no actual idea.

“I don’t know, Noah. Last thing- last thing I knew Chainey carried me out of the building.”

“I didn’t see that,” Noah pointed to the television in the upper corner of the room. “I was out of it when that happened.”

Samantha sighed as she reclined her head against the pillow, swallowing. She only expected Chainey, Parker and everybody else got out in time.

“I can’t hear anything,” Samantha said as she stared at the television.

“Oh, give me a second…”

Noah raised the volume on the television with the remote lying on his side, but there was nothing much of importance on it, just a live feed of the building.

“Samantha, did you see Lazaro inside?”

She negated with her head, anxiousness rising on her stomach as she stared at the television, her throat in a knot.

“Parker was still inside.” She whispered.

“What?”

“Parker-“

 

A loud flash engulfed the screen, the terrible sound filling the rom as they both turned towards the screen, the building being engulfed with smoke and fire as it finally gave out, crumbling towards the ground as it ceased to exist.

Samantha stared, her mouth slightly open as she simply stared.

People screamed outside, nurses running around and people who saw what just happened, but it didn’t reach her ears.

Tears rolled down her cheeks as she saw the destruction on the screen.

 

\---

 

Micah began to scream in panic and horror as he saw the explosion on the screen, his father running inside followed by nurses.

“Where is Davey?! Where is Davey?!” he screamed as the nurses pinned him down, Micah’s father’s face contorted in guilt. He couldn’t find Davey, he wasn’t anywhere near.

The nurses injected something on his skinny arm, his body relaxing almost immediately as he fell unconscious.

As the nurses left the room, the man slumped on the chair next to him, burying his face on his hands as his son’ remained unconscious next to him.

 

\---

 

The teacup crashed against the ground, its liquid contents spilling all over the floor along with the ceramic pieces.

Marianne stared at the screen as the building crumbled before her very eyes, her fingers on her lips as her other hand hanged on the air pathetically as if she was still holding the teacup.

Eyes wide, she looked down to see the mess she had made. Sighing, she leaned down picking up the shattered pieces of the cup.

 

\---

 

Dying hurt.

It was an undeniable fact that dying, in fact, hurt. It was a completely different kind of pain that Parker had ever experienced in his life- he was familiar with the normal kind of pain, the kind you felt when you scrapped your knee against concrete, or the pain when you stretch a sore muscle, or when your fingers touch a burning stove.

Dying was a complete different pain.

It felt raw. It felt so intense to the point that it was almost nonexistent- when he woke up bloodied on the street after the truck hit him, the pain became his entire world. Warm, bloody- it was something Parker never experienced before, the way every atom in his body just simply screamed at the sheer horror that he was still _alive_ , if only for a few seconds.

It was terrifying.

 

The cold concrete was pressed against his cheek, the inside of his body felt burning as he opened his eyes. He couldn’t see nothing- slightly panicking thinking he went blind but only realizing second after that it was just the dust.

Parker attempted to move, but he couldn’t- something pressed his body against the floor, something sharp- said something was piercing his body, pinning him down as well.

He attempted to move his arms, but they only shook pathetically in an attempt of movement. With another jerk, the teenager attempted to move at least an inch, failing in the process.

“Oh.” He said as the bitter realization coldly reached his mind.

His ears burned- he couldn’t hear anything but a loud buzz. Even if Parker had realized that he was in fact trapped under rubble after the explosion, the rest of events to lead to that escaped his mind.

It wasn’t until a tall shadow reached him in horror.

“PJ!” screamed his brother, grabbing his arms and pulling trying to get the teenager free from the rubble, but no matter how much he pulled Parker wouldn’t move an inch.

“Dav-“ he vomited blood unto the floor.

“Shit, fuck…” Davey let go from Parker’s arms, only to cover his own head with his hands shaking uncontrollably, gripping his hair so hard he almost ripped it off his skull.

“No no no no- fuck!”

“Davey, are you-“ Parker head the hurried footsteps of Bastian’s for them to suddenly stop.

“Peej,” Bastian choked out and Parker felt his heart shrink. With difficulty, Parker looked up to the teen.

The aware wished he hadn’t done that. Bastian’s face was contorted in horror or sadness- a mixture of both.

“It’s okay,” Parker said without even realizing it, resting his head against the cold floor. The building continued to shake under him- it would completely be destroyed at any second.

“I’m okay. I’m okay.” He continued to say trying to calm both Davey and Bastian down, but it didn’t help. His brother was gripping harshly at his hair while Bastian only stared.

Parker looked at his blood.

Parker looked at his brother, and at his friend.

Parker looked down at his own blood again.

The building shook.

He was familiar with the pain of death.

 

“You need to leave.” Parker said softly, catching the attention of Davey and Bastian.

They were silent for several seconds.

“No.”

“Davey-“

“No!” he screamed from the top of his lungs, getting up attempting to push away the boulders that were trapping his little body, but it was useless.

“Davey-“

“Shut the fuck up!” he tried to push so hard his fingernails started to bleed.

“I will get you out of here!” He yelled once again, his companion running his hand through his hair shaking uncontrollably.

“Davey…”

He sobbed.

“Please,”

There was blood on the boulders from his scrapping.

“Please listen to me.”

“No!”

Davey knees gave out, the teenager fell next to his brother, loudly sobbing and wailing.

“I cant-“

“The building will collapse.”

“Parker.” Davey grabbed one of his little brother’s hands, pressing it in his forehead as he continued to sob.

“I can’t leave you here, I-I can’t leave you to die! I am not going to leave you to die again!”

Parker cracked a shaky smile, his lips trembling and his teeth shaking, trying his hardest to not cry.

“R-remember back when we sneaked into that haunted house? Back when I was five years old?”

Davey listened, still pressing his brother’s hand between his own.

“Parker-“

“I was so scared, but- ha! You,” Parker cringed as he felt the stones shifting on top of him, crushing him down. “You were like, I’ll protect you Peej! I’ll punch any werewolf I see!”

Parker could hear Davey sobbing becoming stronger, Bastian crouching at his side, tears flowing from his eyes.

“I began to cry b-but, but you said you would. You said you would protect me, and, you did all my life.” Parker bit his tremble lip as his voice began to crack, closing his eyes and crying.

“Let me- let me protect you. I am not good. I was never good at this but if you die, I just-“

“Parker…”

“Please go.”

The building shook once again.

“I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

“I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry Parker God I’m so sorry.”

Bastian got near Parker, sobbing with his eyes red and his cheeks puffy.

“I’m sorry about the day in the skating park.” He choked out, not even able to look at Parker in the eyes.

“I’m sorry about everything that happened to you.”

“Bastian,”

 

As far as he knew, he was already dead. He had been dead ever since the day of the accident, his existence was a joke on life.

He needed to make it worth it.

 

Parker leaned out as much as he could, feeling the stones crushing him but it didn’t matter- it didn’t matter to him now and it would never matter for him after.

Bastian felt how the teenager started to kiss him, his shock quickly replaced by intense sadness at what he knew would happen later. He wanted to grab him, take him away, to take him away from that skate park and from those people and from the institution and from Owen, because no one deserved it, no one deserved what was happening to him and it was infuriating how Parker of all people, _Parker_ was suffering this, not only the fact that he was killed but the fact that he had to die again in such a horrible way and Bastian was there and he couldn’t do anything to make it better- he couldn’t. He couldn’t do anything. He couldn’t do anything at all but return the kiss.

Bastian was never good at reading people feelings.

 

Slowly, Parker pulled away crying, biting his lip and closing his eyes.

“I’m so sorry Bastian.” He cried out “I shouldn-“

“It’s okay,” The older teen couldn’t stop sobbing. “It’s okay, it’s okay.”

“You need to leave.”

He nodded, Bastian slowly stood up, helping Davey to stand up as well.

“God- I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry Parker.” Davey sobbed out. “Fuck- I’m sorry!”

Davey ran out, Bastian following behind closely, and with that, Parker was alone once again.

He breathed in and out, feeling the rocks crushing him as he breathed. He didn’t even need to breath, and yet he felt he should- he felt more human. The teenager wished there was some way to know if Davey and Bastian reached the exit- he could only hope.

“Ah,” Parker choked out, tears falling from his face as he gently put his cheek against the cold concrete once again, closing his eyes, the ceiling crashing and collapsing, Parker knew the building was finally giving out.

He felt the ceiling above him completely give out, more rubble crushing him extinguishing all the light around him.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It hurts

It hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it h u r t s

 

I T        H u R TS

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

He didn’t hurt anymore.


	17. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maggot Boy Lives

Samantha's woke up in a jump, drenched in cold sweat. That has happened a lot lately, she realized. Calming herself down, Samatha lazily got out of the bed, cringing at the sight pain she still felt.  
A week had happened after the explosion, but Samantha could still hear the sheer nothingness that the explosion was whenever her guard went down.  
She sighed, she had finally been released from the hospital. Her arm was in a cast, and her body was sore all over the place alright but she was alive alright, she didn't feel she had the right to complain at all.  
She was lucky, after all.  
With her healthy (but also sore) hand she rubbed at her face, shooting a look to the clock on her wall; it was past noon. All that sleeping could not be good for her at all, she thought.  
She slowly made her way out of her bedroom, and not the shitty-warehouse (Even if Samantha did like the idea of living in a warehouse with two zombies because come on that's awesome, she admitted that it wasn't too much of a suitable place to live, the water sucked, for one.) she used to habitate one week before. Noah made sure that every single one of her things was moved to the actual apartment she owned before she met Parker.  
It was nicer, the warehouse being way too big and empty for her liking, but her apartment felt way too small. She could swear she was choking.  
Walking through the hallway, she heard the television flick through channels.  
That's funny. She didn't recall anybody living with her at all.  
  
Samantha had a pretty good idea of who was changing the channels, but she didn't say anything, rather slowly approaching the livingroom as her fluffy bunny flippers walked cross the apartment.  
Chainey was sitting in the sofa of the livingroom, staring at the television set; even if she was staring at him from behind Samantha could tell the young Aware was very focused on whatever was on television.  
"...After investigation and reports it has been confirmed that Lazaro Palmer, the CEO of Palmer's Institute of the Undead was murdered the moment the detonation on the building went off."  
Oh.  
"The final death toll is of twenty bodies, apart from Lazaro Palmer most of the bodies belonging to members of the terrorist cult who planted the bomb. However, investigation has concluded that these individuals had been murdered before the bomb went off."  
"Chainey?"  
"Among the bodies was the one of the Sovereign Killer, beheaded under the rubble. Emergency services are still searching for more bodies, survivors most unlikely due to the nature of the collapse. Noah Fei, previous spoke person for Palmer Institute, now its CEO has comfirmed the presence of the Sovereign Killer on the building at the time of the explosion, comfirming the death of the serial killer."  
Samantha approached Chainey from behind, placing her hand on his shoulder. He didn't react.  
"...Cellphone footage has shown a large undead figure getting out of the wreckage. Social meda suspect that this figure is the undead vigilante the community has nicknamed 'Maggot Boy'. Noah Fei has refused to speak about said individual, raising the suspicions among the online community."  
"They think I'm him," Chainey blurted out, leaning against Samantha's touch. His entire body was limp against the couch, tilting his head back as he stared at Samantha's ceiling. "Nobody even knows he died."  
"Some do," Samantha said, a tinge of sadness in her voice. "His brother, his friend. Us."  
Chainey didn't answer back, closing his eyes as the fan in the ceiling threw air at him, feeling the cold breeze on his face.  
"What do we do?" The teen said, after a while.  
Samantha made her way to the front of the couch, sitting on it and leaning against Chainey's side, her skin touching his and making notice of how cold he was.  
"Noah hasn't called me yet. He said he would." She bit her lip. "Things will definetely change. I just... I'm not sure how."  
"I don't see any reason for the institute to stay open," Chainey said lowly, awkardly shuffling in his seat his fingers scratching at where his wound was.  
"Well, you 'woke up' as an aware after the Owen incident happened. But in reality, the institute was supposed to learn more about... the undead, and to see if there was any cure to it."  
"Well..." Chainey tried to think of a snark remark or a come back, but he was too tire dmentally to think of one. He just sighed instead, crossing his legs against the couch.  
"How are you feeling, Sam?" he asked after some minutes of silence, the television sit playing footage of interviews to the police, the people that survived, etcetera.  
"Everything hurts." She giggled, as if she suddenly forgot the reason of why everything hurt. "But I'll be okay."  
Samantha snuggled against the couch, taking a very deep breath.  
"How are you doing, Chainey?"  
"I'm-"  
He was going to say he was fine. He was going to say how everything was okay and he forgot about what happened to him, what Marianne did to him, because he was totally fine and totally not messed up about the fucked up thing that happened to him. Totally fine.  
He wasnt a good liar.  
"I don't know." he pinched the bridge of his nose. "I seriously don't know. The only way to not feel... everything is to just stop moving. and Even so, it's like now i am painfully aware of my insides, just there. I just-"  
He quickly grabbed a pillow from the couch, smothering his face on it as she screamed loudly, the pillow drowning it.  
"I really don't want to talk about it right now."  
"That is fine," Samantha said, about to pat Chainey on the shoulder but retracting her hand, realizing it may not be appropiate at the time. "If you ever need to talk about it, I'm here, okay?"  
"Okay..."  
They sat in the couch in silence, watching the screen as it continued to broadcast mre about the incident, repetitions of everything, showing the explosion every half hour or so. Everytime Samantha saw the explosion of fire and heat, her stomach would go cold, her hands shaking, mouth dry as she tried to comprehend everything that would happen now.  
  
Everything that happened then.  
  
"Parker..." Samantha said as if she was going to make some comment about him, but her words got caught in her throat. Chainey turned at her, eyes tired and red.  
"I can't believe--" She cut herself off again, biting her lip harshly as she tried to not cry.  
It suddenly caught up to her the fact that among those ones that died, Parker, P.J, Peej was there. The fact that she would never see him ever again, and the circumstances of his death.  
It had been a while since death had been so permanent to her.  
  
Samantha buried her face on her hands, trying her hardest to not sob, Chainey just sympathetically staring at her, as he pushed a trembling hand on her shoulder.  
She wept.  
  
\---  
  
"This is..."  
He was going to say it was stupid, it was oh so very stupid, it was the stupidest fucking idea that could ever exist, but he didn't have the heart to say it. Even if it was the bloodiest stupidest thing ever, he still wanted to do it. It gave him comfort, and Davey was sure that it gave Bastian comfort as well.  
Maybe it was closure, maybe it was something else- maybe they just wanted to feel good about themselves for one second and he figured that they actually deserved it, after everything that had happened.  
But God, it was stupid.  
"...Hmph." Davey said, still not deciding if he liked the idea or not, or if it was selfish of them to do it because it only meant mometarily good feelings for them.  
"I think he would appreciate it..." Bastian said, as he looked at the massive bouquet of yellow flowers on his hand; Davey had a very similar one with red flowers.  
Both teens made their way through the empty graveyard- it was late. Most people were already home, and rain was coming, there was no one but them that day.  
It felt symbolic, in a way.  
After minutes in silence, they both reached their destination, standing in front of a small grave, the dirt was very uneven, as if whatever crawled out tried to file the hole in a hurry, but even so the grass and flowers had already reclaimed it.  
  
Parker Jones  
Son, Brother, Friend  
  
This was stupid.  
"He's not there," Davey said. "We both know he is not there, Bastian."  
"I know."  
"Why are we doing this?"  
"Because..." Bastia sighed as he tried to find a reason whitin himself of why going to Parker's empty 'grave' was a good idea.  
"Because we didn't know back then. That he was alive."  
Davey eyes widened slightly, and looked at the ground unsure of what to say.  
"I'm not stupid, Davey. I knowt his is useless, he isn't seeing us, he probably would think this is stupid as hell too, but" he rubbed his eyes, trying to keep himself together and not break down sobbing.  
"It just feels right, okay?! It's probably selfish and stupid but it feels right. It feels like the right thing to do."  
"No, no, I..." Davey rubbed the back of his neck, feeling embarrased now. "It feels right. He was very sappy, he would have loved this... I'm sure of it."  
"Yeah..."  
"He loved yellow flowers too."  
"...Ah."  
Slowly and very carefully, they put both bouquets of flowers on the grave, being careful every flower looked gorgeous. After placing both bouquets, they sat down next to the grave, staring in silence.  
They remained like that the rest of the night.  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading this! This is the last part of this fic, which is very important to me because i started this silly one chapter fic about a year ago, when something very personal and awful happened to me and it was one of the very few things that pulled me through. I want to thank everybody. Thank you for reading my fic!!!
> 
> Now, this fic has ended, but i want to write a continuation of what happens but with Chainey, having adopted the title of "Maggot Boy", and trying to find out about his past, While Noah tries to handle the responsability of being CEO of Palmer Institute.
> 
> Thank you for reading!! Love you guys!!!!


End file.
